


A Baptism of Snow

by BrightBlood (Zarathustare)



Series: That Stranger in the Snow [1]
Category: Vampire Knight (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Age-Progression, Alternate Universe - Supernatural, But not exactly, Drama, Gen, Horror Themes - Experimentation, Hunter culture, Mystery, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Reincarnation, Self-Insert, Vampire Politics, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:21:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24106645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarathustare/pseuds/BrightBlood
Summary: When Juri erases Yuuki’s mind, something enters to fill the void. That doesn't mean the action was planned. It does mean this plot goes a bit more sideways, a bit more bloodied.Grown women aren’t accustomed to being in the bodies of children. And this woman isn’t accustomed to being in the world of a manga she barely read.It’s a good thing canon isn’t part of this reality anyways. Well, it won't be after she's done with it.
Relationships: Undecided
Series: That Stranger in the Snow [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1739311
Comments: 32
Kudos: 148





	1. Removed, Resurfaced

Like the way white and black fuzzes on a broken television screen, her mind didn’t process anything until color bled into her vision. 

There was a man seeping red, dying, in front of her right up until he wasn’t. His body dissolved into the snow flying around them, a hurricane of static. Around _them,_ herself and the boy who looked much too young to be so serious and so much taller than her. 

His soft words tensed her body up when he bent down and took her hands. 

“Are you okay? Did he hurt you anywhere?”

_Why are you saying that to me? You’re the one who attacked a grown man._

But really, she didn’t reply with anything. Her arms were shaking and the blood on her gloves was quickly drying in the cold air. If she spoke, her voice would probably shatter like ice.

“...Let’s get you somewhere safe,” he said after she gave no answer.

And then he did something even less boyish than kill a person. 

Bats broke out of the ground, shaking off the snow. They crawled up her and the boy’s legs and one blink later, they were enveloped by them. The bats’ wings brushed up against her clothing, eachother, the air. She knew she was flying, soaring above a blank field high in the heavens, even as her vision was obscured by black fur. 

A while later, after she found herself settling into this new skin of hers, they touched down to a stone ground and the bats flew off to scatter against the dark sky. The building ahead stood firmly in front of them, gothic and small. He led her up the high steps and knocked on the door three times. Not five seconds later a tall, blond-haired man answered.

_Hey, isn’t everyone a bit too tall here?_

“Kaname-san,” the man softly said, surprise and concern covering his features.

“Kurosu-san, something happened.” ~~the boy~~ Kaname replied.

They were quickly let in. 

\---

The entrance area didn’t look like it belonged to a home. More like a formal receiving place for an office. Light wooden chairs and a couch pressed up against the walls. A bit more than a few plants stood out in the bright, yellow light. 

Kaname turned to her and took her hands again, “Yuuki, can you wait here while Kurosu-san and I talk?”

“It’ll be just a little bit, okay, Yuuki-chan?” Kurosu said, giving a strained smile.

An awkward silence muddled the air until she realized she was expected to respond this time. After receiving an abrupt nod, Kaname squeezed her hands and went with Kurosu to a room to the left. 

Immediately after they closed the door, she went up and pressed her ear against it. 

Nothing.

_Are they even whispering or is the wood really that thick?_

She backed off and wandered around the room. Really, it felt like she was back in secondary school, sent to the principal's office. Maybe Kaname was in there speaking with Kurosu like a parent would to the administrator.

 _Yes, I know she wandered off outside and ran into a creepy man. I even had to_ murder _him to get him to back off! But please don’t expel her; she’s such a good student._

There were a few photos on the walls. If she raised her head high enough she could make out a man smiling in front of a black, ornate gate opened wide to show off a great, prestigious looking structure. It was like a cross between an English palace and a cathedral. 

Even a building in a picture emphasized the discrepancy in size between her and her surroundings. She felt small, cold, and wet, now that the ice was melting from her clothes, but that didn’t mean she actually _was_ small. 

And yet.

Everything seemed to indicate she was a **child**. From how large a simple chair was to the way Kaname and Kurosu treated her. She _wasn’t_ though, that was the truth. She was a **grown adult**. Someone who had a life, who had loved ones out there, somewhere, while she was _here_ , standing around like a—

The door swung open.

“Yuuki-chan~!”

Kurosu looked brighter than before. Oh, good. Maybe she wasn’t expelled after all. Kaname walked steadily towards her and stopped, not even touching her. 

“Yuuki, Kurosu-san is going to take care of you and you’ll get to live with him. He’s a good person, even if a little weird,” a noise of protest came from behind him. “I’ll come back for you, Yuuki. So please wait for me.”

He gave her a heavy look, which settled strange on a face as young as his, but hey, she couldn’t judge him for being an adult playing dress-up in a child’s skin.

There was another pause even when she did nod back at him and he looked a little sad, a little desperate, a little something she didn't know. 

“Kaname…-san,” it felt like a whisper-sigh from her lips but Kaname heard and stared back at her. 

What did she want to say? Nothing, really, but he looked so needy. Now was the time for her to comfort this strange boy who brought her to this stranger place. 

“Thank-you,” she settled on. Everyone liked being appreciated, right?

He hesitantly reached out and wiped something off her forehead, “Don’t worry, I’ll always protect you.”

When Kaname pulled back his hand she saw stains of blood stuck on his fingertips. 

_Please, please don’t lick it off like last time._

“Yuuki-chan,” Kurosu said, kneeling down, “I know things might be confusing right now, but it’ll get better. We’ll be living together starting from today, so let’s do our best to make lots of happy memories together, okay?”

“...Okay.”

With the way things had been going, she didn’t have a choice in the matter. Besides, Kurosu really seemed like an honest man, even if he did look strange. Messy, long blond hair fell past his shoulders and he wore the most _ugly_ pajamas paired with too large lion feet slippers.

He beamed, “We should really get you cleaned up, but after that, if you aren’t tired, I can make some yummy treats and we can stay up watching movies.”

_Was this suddenly a sleepover?_

Another slight nod prompted him to start leading her towards a door in the back. When she looked over her shoulder for Kaname’s gaze, she found the rest of the room empty.

\---

The door in the back ended up holding a stairwell leading to an upper area and a lower area. They climbed up. Past a study filled with books and another closed door, Kurosu and the child he thought was Yuuki reached the bathroom.

After removing her coat he checked her body for injuries. He didn’t blink twice at the bloodstained nightdress underneath, but she gasped at the sight. 

_That man must not have been the only person who died today._

The blood didn’t belong to her though. Kurosu turned on the shower and showed her the soap and towels. He stood there, nervously glancing between her and the shower until she caught on. 

“Thank-you, I can do it by myself,” she said, internally wincing at the high pitched voice she heard back. Despite her physical _predicament_ she certainly didn’t need help washing herself.

“Are you sure?” he asked, relief and doubt mixed in his voice.

Glancing back in the mirror, she also doubted the capabilities of the wide-eyed five year old girl who stared back. But after a firm nod, she sent Kurosu out of the room.

\---

After she was dry and dressed in the smallest men’s shirt Kurosu could find, they walked back down to the largest room of the ground floor: the kitchen opening to a dining room. It was mostly western in style with a low table and zabuton in the middle of the eating area, but a regular table and chairs pressed against a wall. 

“Are you hungry, Yuuki-chan?”

Kurosu was already up and taking out appliances from the kitchen. She sat down on one of the zabuton and stared down at her so, so small hands on the table. After about a minute of silence Kurosu kept up an idle running dialogue.

‘Usually I eat out but I suppose I’ll need to learn how to cook now, huh. Children grow up the most healthy eating from home-cooked meals, you know? What do you like to eat, Yuuki-chan? I’ll make lots of meals for you to try. I promise my cooking won’t be as bad. Shit, that was hot. Fuck, I can’t curse around you. Wait—’

They were back to not talking after Kurosu set down two bowls of miso soup that definitely tasted like it came from a packet. He seemed more interested in staring at her, waiting to see if she’d break down crying or whatever children were supposed to do in this sort of situation.

_If this is a dream or hallucination, then it’s the most boring one I’ve had._

It didn’t feel like a dream, though. Usually, when she started questioning reality that was the cue for her body to wake up.

“Umm,” she started, “why do you call me ‘Yuuki-chan’?”

“Oh,” he said. Whatever he expected, it wasn’t _that_ question.

Well, it would be strange if someone asked why they were being called by their name. Except ‘Yuuki’ wasn’t hers. (Except this body _also_ wasn’t hers.)

“Because ‘Yuuki’ is your name. I guess you can change it if you want, but I think ‘Kurosu Yuuki’ sounds very pretty, don’t you think?”

“Isn’t ‘Kurosu’ your name?”

“Oh,” Kurosu(?) said again, sounding more surprised and less sad. “I completely forgot to introduce myself.” He did a partial sitting bow, “I’m Kurosu Kaien, although I hope you’ll call me ‘tou-san’.”

 _Whoa, man. We just met and you’re already asking me to call you_ daddy _?_

“...Okay...tou-san.”

\---

O

\---

Just before dawn would break across the horizon, Yuuki(?) turned around in her bed to face away from the wall. She met the gaze of Kaname, who had been watching her for who knows how long. His eyes, a sort of deep burgundy, were especially striking in the dark room, near glowing. 

_Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?_

That question was more towards herself than the other person. She woke with that thought in her mind, after feeling memories of a dream slip past her fingers. The experience left her cold and muscles taut, but she didn’t think she had a nightmare. Rather, it was the tenseness when waking up on the day of an exam: the feeling that something big was coming and she didn’t prepare for it at all.

“Where did you go?” She finally asked.

“I had to… make some plans.”

That couldn’t be any vaguer.

“Yuuki, I’m going to be very busy for a while, but I’ll come back to visit.”

“Will you promise?” she asked, more for his benefit. His words sounded desperate and like a plea instead of a statement. 

“Of course. I’ll always come back for you,”

_Kaname, if you want to lie successfully, you can’t sound so uncertain._

\---

When she stepped out of the guest bedroom across from the study, ~~Kurosu~~ ~~tou-san~~ Kaien was climbing up from the stairs. He looked more presentable with his hair brushed back to a ponytail, rectangle glasses framing his face, and sans lion slippers.

“Good morning, Yuuki-chan,” he said, sounding too cheerful for 7:00 AM. “I washed your clothes. After breakfast we’ll go to town and get a cute new wardrobe for you, alright?”

“Sure, tou-san.”

He smiled just like last night when she first called him ‘daddy’: half pleased, half forced.

\---

When they walked outside, her eyes widened at the sight of the greenery and architecture. She faced the left side of the same grand building in the photo on the wall. An upper story bridge reached out in her direction like a thin, stone grey arm to grasp a smaller structure at her left. Farther ahead she could see the silhouette of a fountain.

“Amazed, aren’t you?” Kaien spun around with his green shawl stretched out, “Welcome to Cross Academy, your new home.”

His smile didn’t seem as artificial as it had been. Whatever this place was, Kaien truly did like it. He explained more about the estate as they walked. They had spent the night at the groundskeepers house, Kaien preferred to live in a house smaller than the mansion the previous headmasters stayed at. However, that meant they had to travel a kilometer to the gate, where most of the cars were parked.

 _Apparently_ , Kaien was the headmaster of the academy. It seemed impossible for someone as young looking as hum, but a lot of impossible things had been happening anyways. In his words, it was ‘a cozy place to educate future generations on values of acceptance, understanding, and knowledge’. Cross Academy wasn’t a religious school, despite the name and the three chapels still on the premises. It _had been_ a catholic school, until the previous owners closed it down around a hundred years ago and Kaien reopened it to be secular. 

“Why did it close in the first place?”

“Well, everyone lost interest in going.”

 _Huh, that_ totally _seems like the whole story._

They reached the fountain, a shallow but wide structure with a statue in the middle. Three girls and three boys were around it, all seemed to be fifteen or sixteen except for one guy who was clearly just entering puberty. 

“Good-morning, gakuchou-sensei,” one of the guys said. 

A girl with a short bob wasn’t so formal, “Hey, sensei, why’s there a kid on campus?”

“Harimoto-san, Hirotsu-san, I’d like you to meet,” Kaien paused and gestured with his arms, “my very own daughter: Yuuki-chan.”

A chorus of comments erupted from that news, which amounted to nice ways to say ‘Gakuchou-sensei has a daughter?’ and ‘But aren’t you a lonely bachelor with no one in your life?’. Next came the introductions that she struggled to keep up with.

The youngest boy was the brother of a girl with short blonde hair, with the surname Ichinose. The girl with the bob-haircut was Hirotsu Shizuko. The boy who said ‘But I thought ‘gakuchou-sensei was married to his job?’ was called ‘Mori-kun’ and the girl who told him off for rudeness was ‘Eriko, but you can call me Eripi-chan’.

After some talk, like ‘We’re going to town to pick out Yuuki-chan’s winter wardrobe’ and playful banter in ‘Hey, let’s go together and make it a school field trip. ...What? We’d only miss chemistry’, they parted their ways. 

Yuuki stared down at the ground as they walked. There were still little stains of blood on her boots. That group consisted of a bunch of teens, who probably couldn’t drive. Couldn’t drink in some countries. And even they treated her like she was younger than them. Everytime she interacted with a person, she was one step closer to being forced to acknowledge that _what the fuck, am I actually a—_

“Yuuki-chan, this one is my car,” Kaien announced.

It was a nondescript gray vehicle with the one noticeable feature being a crest sticker on the back window. She went to the passenger’s seat only to pause at the driving wheel placed on the wrong side.

_Isn’t England the only country who drives on the left?_

“Ah, Yuuki-chan, this is where you’ll be sitting,” Kaien said, opening the… back seat.

Because, of course, _children_ couldn’t ride shotgun.

\---

Going to town brought unexpected complications.

It wasn’t her fault, Yuuki refused to think otherwise. It also wasn’t Kaien’s fault, she grudgingly admitted a while later. Really, it was just the byproduct of some careless assumptions and unfortunate mistakes. Like the assumption by Yuuki that, while seeming like a five year-old girl, she could surely walk around freely in the shopping plaza, approaching any store that held her fancy. Or like the mistake by Kaien, who either forgot he had a child to begin with or didn’t realize he needed to keep an eye on small children in a crowd.

A mother with her own gaggle of children stopped her after half an hour left alone. Her ‘Are you alone, little miss?’ was countered with a firm ‘no’, but Yuuki didn’t have any defense when the woman followed up with ‘So then where’s your parents?’.

Fortunately, the walk to the police station wasn’t long. Unfortunately, it took another fifteen minutes for Kaien to realize he was supposed to have a shopping partner. The awkward small talk with her accompanying police officer began with ‘so, you’re Kurosu Kaien’s daughter?’ then went to ‘Well, for only a day’ and ended with a bewildered look. When Kaien finally met her at the station, the look of unmistakable guilt on his face fizzled out Yuuki’s annoyance.

There was a small scene of Kaien profusely apologizing, apparently he was on autopilot and went ahead to get groceries, and Yuuki acting more like a reprimanding adult than a scared daughter who lost her father. Then, they reenacted the ‘You have a daughter, Kurosu-senpai?’ scene with the police. 

They were more polite in their surprise of Kaien having a family. Nonetheless, it ended up being a longer shopping trip than expected.

\---

It would have taken two trips to get the food and clothing back to the groundskeeper house if not for a passing staff member, who helped them, while giving the ‘miracle child’ of headmaster Kurosu curious looks along the way. Yuuki escaped from having to help put the groceries away with an ‘I’m going to take a nap’ and a ‘No, I don’t need to be tucked in’ before bolting up the stairs. 

She closed the door to the guest bedroom and collapsed on the hard, wooden floor. The bed was less than five feet away, but she didn’t need to be reminded how small she was with how she had to struggle to even sit on it. 

Wardrobe shopping felt like the most creative and uncomfortable punishment a person could think of. The clothes were too small, in the way an adult would view them, but seemed to fit her stupidly tiny body perfectly. They were too ‘cutesy’, in the way a grown woman wouldn’t be caught dead in them, but the shop associates thought they looked very fitting. The bags were too heavy, she couldn’t even carry one of them, and Kaien just smiled patronizingly when she tried. It was all a bit too _much_.

She couldn’t lie to herself, couldn’t think it was a dream or an act of god LSD trip, couldn’t pretend she was fine with this in any way at all. She was a child, she saw another child kill a man without hesitation, she was now the daughter of a man who didn’t blink twice at the thought of adopting a newly blood-covered orphan. 

Her eyes burned and she couldn’t stop the sob coming out of her like vomit. 

If this was reincarnation, then shouldn’t she have died first?

She covered her mouth and nose until her face burned from the effort and survival instinct kicked in to force a gasp of air. However, that meant she was too busy taking lungfuls of air to cry.

How was she supposed to make sense of this? Clearly, whatever **thing** , god, space and time, or reality, that did this didn’t really care what she felt. 

_Wallowing in despair won’t fix this. There has to be some good in this._

She immediately shied away from the thought. Letting this abrupt relocation of personhood go felt like rolling over and saying ‘okay, life, go ahead and fuck me over whichever way you want!’. However, didn’t this happen to her despite her lack of consent? She was absolutely powerless: couldn’t revert this transmigration, couldn’t shop or cook on her own, couldn’t even touch objects five feet off the floor without a step stool.

She lay there like that, turning over every aspect of her life which had gotten worse and picking it apart in her head until it felt like she was just repeating words whose meanings dissolved like paper in water. Then she went over her memories, which weren’t quite as solid as she would have preferred. Exhaustiation and stress muddled the specifics. Flashes of scenes and leftover emotions entered and exited her mind without order.

She remembered ULille, and the old student housing with broken air conditioning. Even thinking about it made her tense up from thoughts of classes and tests. There was some place where she swam around in the ocean with three other women. They pet manta rays and tried to ride dolphins, but one of the instructors was sick. Her tenth birthday was in a tree house; it was so cold it took her brother four tries to light the candle. That was one of the few times she liked him. Her cat died recently. She entered her apartment on a Wednesday to be greeted with a small, cold body. Like she needed _more_ depressing information. 

Kaien’s knocking on the door ripped her from her thoughts. She opened it to be greeted with a smile. He smiled a lot, even when it looked like he was forcing himself. The bachelor probably didn’t even want children, so why did he accept her so readily?

“Did you have a nice nap? I made some dinner if you’re hungry.”

“It was nice,” she mumbled, and followed him to the dining room.

_Sorry, Kaien, you ended up with not only a child, but a deficient one._

They had white porridge with fish and vegetables for dinner, which attested to Kaien’s lack of cooking skills if she needed another example than last night and morning. At least he didn’t think of her like an infant and serve it flavorless. After a silent dinner and minimal talking when putting the clothes away, they both looked at the clock and then each other.

“I don’t suppose you’re tired enough for bedtime?”

It was 7 PM.

“I can look around the house,” she offered, which Kaien reluctantly let her do after he gave her a quick tour and told her to call him if she needed help.

The layout was pretty simple: there was the kitchen/dining room on the ground floor as well as his office he used for work. The upper floor had two bedrooms, a private study, a bathroom, and a closet. She shouldn’t go in the basement because he had workout equipment and laundry machines.

It might have been a boring place to some people, but Yuuki wasn’t averse to doing in-depth snooping. Her height cut her search ability in half, which meant looking under a lot of furniture to only find dust bunnies. For a fleeting moment, she was excited to explore the study full of books until she opened one.

Japanese. Naturally, it wasn’t in a language she was fluent in. She might’ve gained some sort of freedom from being able to read and the world couldn’t let _that_ happen. She knew some kanji, but never really tried in her Mandarin classes. In essence, a fountain of knowledge was before her and she didn’t have a mouth to drink from it.

There were other things in the room, like a map too high for her to properly look at and a drawer full of pens. Some parts of the large cherry wood desk couldn’t be opened without a key, which Yuuki felt was incredibly unfair. _If you live alone, then why would you need to lock stuff up?_

The study was no good, the closet was full of linen, and the bathroom was just a bathroom. She didn’t dare approach Kaien’s bedroom. An adult’s room was private, and she didn’t have the childhood innocence to not recognize an embarrassing object if she came across it. This left the office, which Kaien was at.

She entered without him noticing and gave it a cursory look: a few photos of him with other adults, strange souvenirs, presumably gathered from overseas trips, degrees in teaching and anthropology. She sat on one of the chairs and stared at Kaien typing away on the computer.

_1_

“...”

_2_

“...”

_3_

“...”

Yuuki counted to 164 until Kaien acknowledged her.

“Was there something you wanted, Yuuki-chan?”

_What would you do if I just started screaming until my head exploded?_

“I think I’m ready for bedtime now.”

\---

O

\---

“So did you do anything fun while I was away, Yuuki-chan?”

“I stared at a wall.”

“...Eh?”

It was partly a joke said in deadpan, but more than half of it had been serious. While Kaien was away in his afternoon meeting, the only options left to Yuuki were to stare at text documents she couldn’t read, wreck everything she could see like a hyperenergetic dog, and think. She chose contemplation instead of destruction and decided the only way she could gain back any sort of control was if she gathered as many adult skills as possible. That or kill herself. Death might send her back to her own body, but she couldn’t reach the kitchen knives. This meant she would need to gain reading and writing materials, since Kaien was too busy running an academy to tutor a child as well. 

“Tou-san, there’s nothing in the house.”

A look of understanding came over him, “Well...isn’t there a T.V.?”

He walked over to the dining area and opened a cabinet, where the knobs were definitely too high for her to reach, to reveal an old box television. After setting it to a documentary, Kaien gave her the remote and promised they would go to town after he got some of his work done.

However, the visit to town ended up being pushed to the next day when, at 9 PM, Yuuki awoke from her nap and hunger pushed her to enter the office. Kaien was still there, completely absorbed in his work. He apologised for losing track of time. 

_You completely forgot you had to take care of a child again, didn’t you?_

They were both disappointed in themselves.

\---

O

\---

Three days later, Yuuki gained a rudimentary understanding of the Japanese writing structure and alphabets. It wasn’t nearly enough to even read the title of one of the books in the study, despite her frustration, but it was a start. The house stopped being tomb-silent with the near constant television noise in the background. Kaien tried switching it to some simple kids cartoons until giving up. She much preferred what seemed to be the Japanese version of the _Knowledge Network_ he set it to the first time.

It was a near comfortable pattern they set themselves into, and if home _isn’t_ where the heart is, then Yuuki would call it home. She and Kaien talked everyday, mainly around meal times when he asked what she learned that day, and he read to her nearly every night. It still felt like living with a stranger. Maybe this was perfectly fine. Maybe only Yuuki thought their relationship was totally weird. After all, she didn’t remember how much she interacted with her parents when she was an actual child. She didn’t remember much of her life, anyways, but she didn’t like looking at that observation too closely. Questioning things too much made her body shake and breath hitch, as if her lizard brain understood it wasn’t something to be touched. 

Today broke from routine when Kaien opened the front door to reveal three shining student faces.

A few greetings later and an ‘Ichinose-san, you weren’t in trouble, were you?’ countered with ‘I just wanted to keep an eye on these two troublemakers, gakuchou-sensei’, Kaien introduced Yuuki to her new babysitters.

“Before, you were fine with leaving me alone,” she very deliberately did not pout, but there was some ~~childish~~ ~~petulant~~ _adult and reasonable_ furrowing of the eyebrows.

“But now you don’t have to be lonely when I get out of the house,” he said.

She _had_ gotten bored retracing handwriting worksheets whenever she gave up trying to understand the television. Kaien also bought her some other toys when they went out to fetch reading materials. But the only fun thing to do with the dolls was to dismember them and unsuccessfully fix them back together again.

“Don’t worry, Yuuki-chan, we’ll have lots of fun,” said Shizuko, the girl with brown hair.

“And we definitely won’t break anything,” Mori helpfully added.

One quick tour later with ‘Don’t go into the basement, don’t cook anything, there’s food in the fridge. If you actually break anything, you’ll get in worse trouble’, and Kaien set off for his presidential duties. 

“So…,” Shizuko started after ten seconds of silence. She let it hang in the air for another fifteen.

The three teens stared at her. While Yuuki was the host and they were the guests, wasn’t the dynamic supposed to be a little bit different? She raised an eyebrow back at them.

_Among the three of you together, you don’t know how to entertain a child?_

“Yuuki-chan, what do you do for fun around here?” Ichinose asked.

“Well...there’s a T.V.”

They ended up doing exactly what she would have done, had she been left alone. Namely, take out all her educational materials while soft television noise filled up the empty space.

“Wow, you’re a really diligent kid, huh?” commented Mori, watching her go over her kanji sheets.

“The handwriting is even better than Mori-kun’s,” Shizuko said, looking through the finished papers.

“Hey, you, what was that?”

Ichinose, who was looking at a stack of DVDs beside the television, replied from over her shoulder, “She said you’re worse than a six year old.”

Mori pouted and gave a quick reply that Yuuki didn’t catch, but made Ichinose laugh.

“Yuuki-chan,” Shizuko lightly tapped her head with a pencil, “how old are you anyway?”

_Err...that’s a good question._

“Oh, you know,” she did a little shrug of her shoulders as if to say ‘and that’s how the world goes’.

“No, that’s why we’re asking you.”

Yuuki could feel her face redden as three sets of eyes stared at her, “That— it’s a secret.”

“I see. It’s a _secret_ ,” Mori repeated, beginning to grin.

Thus commenced a mini-interrogation. 

‘How old is gakuchou-sensei, your father?’

‘It’s… a secret.’

‘What’s your name, Yuuki-chan?”

‘It’s a secret.’

‘Is the sky blue today?’

‘It’s a secret!’

‘ _Is_ there a sky today?’

‘Secret! Secret! Secret!’

They seemed so entertained at the idea of a six(?) year old having some sort of hidden knowledge. Yuuki was at a cross between being amused herself and irritated that she talked herself into a corner and had to act like a child. It was suspicious for someone to not know their age and she couldn’t say their harmless gakuchou-sensei suddenly took her in off the snow-covered metaphorical streets. 

Well, she _could_. He never said it was a ~~secret~~ piece of knowledge best kept hidden. However, she didn’t know the circumstances of that day and she wasn’t going to announce what she barely understood.

“Hey, where’s Keiko-san?”

That must have been the forename of Ichinose. They looked around and true to form, no blonde in sight.

“Maybe the old headmaster’s ghost got her,” Shizuko continued ominously and shook Mori’s shoulders from behind. “OooOOOooHhh.” 

He rolled his eyes, “I’ll go get her.”

While Mori headed upstairs after checking the office, Shizuko brought down the DVDs from the shelf and started looking through them.

“We can watch one of these if you want.”

The genres were...eclectic. Some supernatural horror, some historical dramas, more than a few rom-coms. She picked one up that had two school girls covered in blood and an easily readable title on the cover. _Wizard of Darkness_ it read. Shizuko took it out of her hands before she could read the back cover synopsis.

“How about we don’t pick something that will traumatize you and get me in trouble?”

_Out of the two of us, I’m the one who’s less likely to be scared from a silly movie._

They sorted through more of the films, ignoring the unmarked CDs. She didn’t recognize any of the titles, although it was more her friends, than herself, who got into Japanese media. Besides, Kaien only seemed to have old and outdated media. The opening of the door halted their search.

“I can’t find Keiko-san,” Mori said, entering the room alone.

Shizuko glanced at a horror film case. “Do you think it really was—”

“Shut up,” he huffed. “She’s probably just outside and ditched us. This isn’t _her_ detention punishment.”

“Or she’s in the basement,” Yuuki suggested.

This led them to walk down the stairs and face the basement door. They weren’t supposed to go there, but what if Keiko was already there? More importantly, what was _really_ in the basement? It was the one room Yuuki hadn’t been in. 

“Yuuki-chan, what’s in this room anyways?” asked Mori.

She looked at the two teens with wide eyes. _So you’re here as a punishment, huh?_

“I dunno. Tou-san said not to go in there because it was super dangerous and scary.”

She tried to simultaneously appear innocent and give the impression that Kaien _definitely_ kept the dead bodies of naughty school children in there.

Mori’s eyes widened, but Shizuko scoffed and pulled the handle.

The door remained shut.

“If it’s locked then where—”

“What are you guys doing here? Gakuchou-sensei told us not to go in the basement,” Keiko announced behind them, raising an eyebrow at Mori’s loud gasp.

“Where were you? I looked all over for you,” he said, flustered.

Keiko narrowed her eyes, “In the bathroom, where else? You should have looked harder.”

“Where, inside the toilet?”

Yuuki glared at the door in front of her. Who kept an entire room locked when they lived alone? Did this fellow really have such secrets?

Well, besides the secret that the president of the prestigious _Cross Academy_ apparently liked romantic dramas. Whatever tension that came from Keiko’s disappearing act left the group when they returned and discovered that information. After some initial immature giggling by the students with ‘Wow, I didn’t know gakuchou-sensei liked this sort of stuff’, they settled down to watch a couple episodes of _Go Back 夫婦_.

The girls were immediately interested in the series and even Mori seemed to quickly become intrigued by it. Yuuki had completely lost the plot when the subtitles used some of the 2,000 kanji she didn’t know. At least the lead actress was pretty, even though Yuuki had no idea what the characters were talking about. They spoke too quickly for her to parse the information.

Kaien came back in the middle of the third episode. He dropped his bags and picked Yuuki up when she came out to greet him. “Yuuki-chan~! I missed you, did you miss me?” he said as he spun her around.

She froze in his arms. He hadn’t used _that_ tone of voice since the first night. Peeking behind his back, she half expected to see another newly orphaned child he adopted. “...Welcome home, tou-san.”

“Yuuki-chan” Kaien set her down, “I know I was out later than usual, but that’s because I got you a belated birthday present.”

_...Huh? Since when did I have a birthday?_

He slid one of his bags towards her, except it wasn’t a paper sack, but a cardboard box. It folded into itself to give a pointed top with a handle and there were large, round holes on the upper portions which made the impression they were for air. To let something _breathe_.

Against her better judgement, Yuuki stuck a finger in one of those holes. She felt, just for a second, the wet nose of an animal touch the tip of her pointer finger. 

“She’s a bit shy right now but I’m sure you and neko-chan will be great friends. That way,” Kaien moved away the hair that had fallen on her face, “you won’t be so lonely when I’m gone, okay?”

“I thought that was our job,” Mori said. He still leaned over her to try to get a look at the cat.

“Gakuchou-sensei,” began Keiko, “since it was Yuuki-chan’s birthday recently, what age did she turn?”

Yuuki looked at her supposed father, who had a stilled smile on his face.

“Oh,” he gave a half shrug, “you know how it goes.”

Kaien was much better at deflecting questions than she was. Especially when he had brought them food.

\---

After Shizuko, Mori, and Keiko ate their fill and said their goodbyes, Yuuki was still in the dining room. She lay on her side to stare at the new addition to the household currently under the low table. She was a skinny, russet not-quite-grown cat, who immediately searched for a place to hide the moment they opened the box.

“If you’re patient, she’ll come out on her own,” Kaien said as he drank his tea at the table with chairs.

“I know,” she replied. Intellectually, she _did_ know that. It’s just that, she was so cute, despite being a bit dirty. Her green-yellow eyes stared back at Yuuki, unblinking. 

_You look so much like Stardust._

That was a stretch, she conceded to herself a second later. Besides both being cats, there was little in common. Stardust was a male and black. One of her friends always called him Ziggy and would pick him up, singing _Starman_ at him, while drunk. She couldn’t remember that friend’s face anymore. 

“Do you like cats, tou-san?”

“It’s more that cats don’t like me. But I think this one was too desperate to know better.”

“Desperate?” Yuuki slid her arm under the table and tried to tempt the cat with a wiggle of her fingers. No luck.

“Ah, she was sort of on the streets when I found her. Don’t worry, she has all her shots now. You just need to give her some love.”

_Love? She’s been picked off the streets, confused and terrified. Simple love isn’t going to fix that._

There was a knock at the door. Two more followed.

Kaien rose to answer it, but Yuuki stayed staring at the cat. 

_Who knows what you’ve been through. What you’ve gone through. If only you could tell me and we can share our secrets together._

Distantly, her name was called by Kaien, and then a moment later, a soft voice, “Yuuki.”

Slowly, she sat up to meet that person’s gaze.

“Kaname.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is my first posted work, So I don't know how well this will be received or if people will notice it at all. If you *have* read all the way through, then I sincerely thank you.  
> The lore of this story will be severely AU, but I'm hoping that interests people. Right now, it looks like the fourth/fifth chapter will get to the middle school years (where Zero enters). The pairings are currently undecided because I'll be partially leaving it up to the readers.


	2. Skinship & Scares

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note that the age rating changed from Teen to Mature, NOT because I've written sexual content.  
>  I'm going to use romaji for addresses/references to family titles (and a few others) in order to try to impart the nuance in how a person thinks of their family member. I'll give definitions of the terms used in this chapter:  
> 
> 
> -
> 
> gakuchou-sensei - I'm using it to refer to the headmaster of the school, Kaien, but that isn't usually how it's used in real life.  
>  chichi/haha - Used to refer to one's own parents and is the standard way.  
>  chichi-ue/haha-ue - Used to refer to one's own parents. Rarely used in real life, in media it indicates the speaker comes from a really formal upbringing.  
>  otou-san/okaa-san - Used to address to one’s own parent’s or refer to a different person’s parents. It's the most common way to talk about/to parents.

Whatever grand moment of reunion they were meant to have was ruined by a throaty growl and subsequent hissing. Yuuki looked back and watched as the cat moved out from under the table to the other side of the room, hiding in the gap between the refrigerator and kitchen counter.

“...She doesn’t like you,” Yuuki said, not without a hint of accusation.

Was it cruel to say that to a child? Maybe. Did animals have a sixth sense to tell whether someone is a bad person? Definitely. She didn’t forget the previous encounter of blood they had, even if she had been ignoring it. That entire night conjured up questions of reality and magic and suddenly living in another world; _but is it really another world when you barely remember the original one?_

“Sorry,” Kaname said, indeed seeming regretful, “animals don’t usually like 吸血鬼.”

She nodded like she understood 100% of what he said instead of only 75%. Context, looking like she wasn’t completely lost, and residual knowledge from the body she entered were her main reasons for comprehending anything anyone said.

“Maybe you should stop being 吸血鬼 then,” she replied.

Kaien made a face from his position behind Kaname, like she committed a great social faux pas.

_Please don’t tell me 吸血鬼 means ‘cancer patient’ or something._

“Ah, Yuuki-chan, that’s sort of impos-- well, very hard to do.”

Kaname walked closer to sit in front of Yuuki, “Are you afraid of me now?”

“...Should I be?”

The hand that had already reached out to touch her face paused. He really seemed to be considering it. When their eyes met, Kaname gave his answer, “Yes.”

Kaien made a noise between shock and sadness. 

\---

When he wished, Kaien’s presence could fill a room and turn the strained atmosphere between two not-children into something more pleasant. Yuuki alternated her gaze from her warm tea cup to Kaname’s face. She had never realized how cherubic a kid’s face could be. His eyes ruined the image. Too solemn. 

She allowed Kaien to do her speaking for her, talking about everything she had done in the days without Kaname, like he really was a proud parent showing off his child’s accomplishments. However, Kaname was not an adult (didn’t _look_ like one anyways) and she’d be damned if she would let Kaien pull out her writing work with all the condescending pride of pulling out a child’s macaroni art. 

“What have you been doing, since then?” Yuuki interrupted.

“I’ve been busy. Sorry I couldn’t visit you.”

_Do you think that’s a proper answer?_

“Busy with what?”

Kaname shared a glance with Kaien, at the other side of the low table. He spoke in a deliberate off-hand manner, “I moved into Ichijo Asato’s estate, so I’ve had to get used to things. Yuuki, how have you been getting used to living with Kurosu-san?”

“Why aren’t you living with your parents?”

With those words, the mood of the conversation dropped in icy waters. 

“Ah, Yuuki-chan, recently his parents were killed,” Kaien added softly.

‘Did he kill them?’ she wanted to ask. Yuuki held her tongue, it was too insensitive to ask that, even for her. Just because he was a killer, didn’t mean he engaged in parricide. The death of parents was a terrible, heart-shattering thing. She felt amputated when her own died. 

…

…

Huh?

Since when did her parents die? She--- the only funeral she remembered was for an uncle. Both her mother and father were alive, along with her brother, waiting for her to come back from this adventure-dream. She searched for her most recent memory of her parents. It would have been during the holidays, right? They- ???

An invisible hand grasped her heart, sending pinprick lightning throughout her body. The feeling of her brain melting inside her skull consumed her senses. Sudden fear flooded her senses, like someone suddenly pressed the edge of a knife to her spine. A monster made up of memory breathed down her neck. She was missing something devastatingly important, wasn’t she? But searching for it put her into a tug-of-war of instinctual repulsion and desperation. 

Her face must have shown some trouble, because Kaien was making a lot of noise. His words bled together the same way a calligrapher’s brushstrokes melded to one squiggly line after the hand passed from exhaustion. _Why is this body shaking?_ It didn’t feel cold. Kaname had moved to the side, but she couldn’t make out his expression. 

She needed to get out ~~of this body~~ and away. Out. But she couldn’t do that, could she? The body was treated like a child. She couldn’t go. Couldn’t reach the counter or speak the language or---. What _could_ she do to get away? Die. Sleep. She needed to sleep. They allowed her to sleep. If she slept, she didn’t have to think about what was happening to her. 

Whoever said the dead looked like they were sleeping was a fucking _liar_. They only ever looked **dead** with their eyes open like that.

The rest of the night was a blur.

\---

O

\---

“Look, Yuuki-chan, I brought a playmate!”

Despite Keiko’s enthusiastic introduction of her brother, the younger Ichinose didn’t seem excited. Yuuki eyed him, Masao. He couldn’t have been older than lower secondary school age. Young, but still half older than her current body. 

“Playmate?” she repeated, just to fill the space. 

Keiko gave a firm nod, “I’m babysitting today, so you two can play and I can relax.”

Yuuki ignored Masao’s scowl. “I already have a playmate: Daedala, the cat.”

“Eh? What kind of name is that? Besides, Masao-kun is just a tiny bit better than a cat.”

Ignoring Masao’s shout of ‘Just a little bit better?’, Yuuki let them into the house. Kaien had left a while ago, but she had known she wouldn’t be unattended for long. After _that event_ , Kaien started treating her with, well, kid-gloves. Kaname hadn’t returned since. Maybe that was for the better. Four months passed between them and that was enough time to settle into the pretense that she really was a five year old child. The way Kaien treated her was still annoying. He had hidden away all scary movies from his collection. 

It wasn’t safe for Yuuki to touch her memories of _not_ being Yuuki. Being metaphorically bitten with her mind’s aggressive self-defense mechanism had left her shy from trying again. Perhaps that was for the best, from a logical standpoint. Knowing about what she _had_ been would leave the experience of what she currently _was_ all the more rotten. 

Not that she wasn’t already discontent with her present self.

\---

“She doesn’t like you either.”

Masao scoffed and did his best to act like he didn’t care. His gaze directed at the hiding form of a red cat gave him away. “I don’t like pets anyways… Hey, what do you mean ‘either’?”

Yuuki quickly picked up Daedala, who was crawling to get behind the desk. “She also hisses at chichi-- gakuchou-sensei.”

“Whatever. They don't _personally_ dislike me,” his mouth twisted as he stared intently at Daedala. Not even the prickliest of exteriors could ignore the cuteness of a cat. “She’ll like me if I give her treats. Do you have any?”

Those were located in the kitchen with the other pet supplies. Yuuki ran down to fetch them and paused at the emptiness. A peek in the office showed no sign of life. On the second floor, no one was in the study or bathroom. She even checked the closet. _Hmm_. Her own room revealed Masao down on the floor, trying to coax a growling cat, which had hidden itself underneath the bed.

Cooing at the cat didn’t work and they finally resorted to climbing underneath to retrieve her. For a street cat, Daedala was pretty docile, only scratching at Masao once. It took a quarter of the treat bag for her to allow him the honor of a few pets. 

“Why is your uniform different from the others?” Yuuki asked, idly watching the dark-clothed Masao play with the cat teaser. She much prefered the white style the other children had. 

“I’m in the lower level. The others are older.”

She waited a beat for clarification, then spoke again. “What does lower level mean?”

Sighing, like Yuuki should have known it earlier, Masao explained, “The lower level is for years one through four, that’s ages eleven through fourteen. The higher level is years five, six, seven.” He gave her a look, “This is a boarding school.”

She returned the annoyance, “I know _that_.”

“Do you? Why are you here anyways?”

Looking down, Yuuki repeated part of the story Kaien gave her, “My mother died. Now, chichi is taking care of me.”

Technically true. She was told her current body’s mother _was_ dead. The biological father was _also_ dead and then Kaien adopted Yuuki. Except the forged birth certificate he showed her had a ‘Karuso Kaien’ as the one and only father. ‘It’s safer if people believe we’re blood related.’ he had said.

“Oh, sorry.”

Yuuki shrugged off the awkwardness. It wasn’t as if she remembered Yuuki’s parents. Play was muted following that and finally ended when Daedala decided to sleep on the bed. They went to find Keiko, who wasn’t on the second floor. 

On the stairwell, Yuuki took Masao’s sleeve and pointed down at the basement door. 

“Isn’t that locked?”

Yes, it should have been and was all the times Yuuki checked. Yet, Keiko had a habit of disappearing whenever she was in the middle of babysitting Yuuki. Maybe she even caught on to Yuuki’s suspicion and sicced Masao on her to keep her distracted. 

Yuuki tried the door handle. It didn’t budge. 

“She’s probably just in the kitchen,” he left before she could reply.

Masao’s distant calls for his sister could be heard in the other room. It was possible Keiko was just naturally hard to find. It wasn’t like she ever became _missing_. If Yuuki called out enough, Keiko would suddenly appear. 

She could have easily missed it, the _click_ of the door unlocking was so quiet. 

It opened just an inch, enough for an eye to peek through. Yuuki moved back and watched Keiko slide through. 

“What were you doing there?” She asked.

Keiko jumped back and hit her head on the doorframe. “Shit! I-- warn a girl next time, will you?”

“Warn you for being in my own house?” Yuuki said. Technically, Kaien’s house. Well, she had been living in it for over half a year. Maybe it’s supposed to be her home too?

Building ownership didn’t matter. Keiko was caught. When Masao came back from his fruitless search, she had no excuse to give. 

‘No one was supposed to go in the basement, you know. It was locked for a reason. Wouldn’t gakuchou-sensei be angry if he knew you went in there? He’ll surely punish you.’ Those thoughts hung in the air after some pointed words. 

“Don’t worry,” Yuuki said with a smile too smug to be innocent, “I won’t tell if you show us what’s inside.”

Keiko frowned, staring at her. “Aren’t you a bit too devious for a toddler?”

\---

The basement belonged to a spy. That was the only explanation Yuuki could come up with when she saw the contents. Half of the room was covered in blue mats next to a mirrored wall. A few worn punching bags stood to the side. The open cabinet of traditional weapons wasn't out of place, given context. Bo staffs, chakrams, and nunchaku, could be explained away as a harmless hobby. 

The other half held a table map with pins in various locations, connected to other pins by colored string. Shooting target stands rested against a corner. Tall gym lockers stood firmly shut next to a desk containing various papers and-- hey, that’s where the films went to. 

“It’s like a mini-hunter headquarters,” Masao said.

“Hunter?” Yuuki echoed. Unless Kaien was ‘hunting’ humans, she didn’t see--

They all stilled and looked at eachother. The siblings, because they might have revealed an unintentional secret, and Yuuki, when she realized the implications of the room.

Keiko spoke up, “Nevermind about that. You saw the room, so let’s go back.”

“I can ask chichi about it later. You should just tell me now,” said Yuuki, while beginning to take back the DVDs on the desk. Kaien was too overprotective. She had probably seen worse horror films when she was an adult. 

“Do you know what a 吸血鬼 is?” Keiko said slowly.

“Of course.” Not at all. Besides _that_ time, she hadn’t encountered the word in all her studies. “I’ve met one.”

The following silence clearly indicated she had said something wrong. Picking up another film, Yuuki glanced at the cover. _ドラキュラ：最初の吸血鬼_. A man’s pale face was opened wide to show two long fangs. _Dracula: the first vampire_. 

_Oh, that’s why Kaien hid the DVDs._

“Gakuchou-sensei, Kaien, is a vampire hunter.” She realized aloud. In terms of weirdness, it wasn’t surprising at all. However, thinking Kaien could be a cool hunter of the night didn’t seem possible. Yuuki looked up at the two children, “Are you guys vampires too?”

Their twin looks of disgust gave her all the answers she needed. 

\---

“Yuuki-chan, did you learn anything new today?”

Yuuki glanced down at her dinner of ochazuke. Kaien’s cooking skills were improving rapidly. “I learned that you’re a vampire hunter.”

Kaien set his glass down. “Did you hear that from Ichinose-san?”

“Was I not supposed to know?”

A sigh. “I used to be a hunter, but I’m retired now. There’s a lot of things in my past that I regret.” He looked at her sternly, “Yuuki, it’s important to know that not all vampires are bad.”

“Keiko-san and Masao-kun think differently.”

Kaien’s mouth twisted and he rested his hand on hers, “But Kaname-san isn’t a bad person, right?”

Kaname had said ‘yes, you should be afraid of me’ and looked repentant for something he never did. Kaname could kill her, a little mortal girl. Kaname _did_ kill a man, another vampire. For her.

“He isn’t bad to me.”

“He isn’t bad to a lot of people. Not to humans.”

_But it’s not just humans out there in the world._

\---

O

\---

He came a week later. 

Like a recreation of the last time he was there, Kaname and Yuuki sat opposite ends of the low table with Kaien to the right. The tea this time was jasmine. 

“If there’s any questions you’d like to ask, Kaname-san can answer them,” Kaien said with a smile. 

However, there wasn’t much to say. Kaien already answered them when she asked. Vampires could be considered as a different species, but they were close enough to humans that they could propagate together. Their existence was a secret, yet Kaien wanted to slowly bring about a harmonious connection between them and humans. Vampire hunters ‘punished’ only the bad vampires who hurt humans, while internal disputes among vampires were handled by their council. On the top of their social hierarchy, sat Kuran Kaname, a pureblood.

How can a vampire be killed? How dangerous is a vampire? How to fight a vampire? Kaien had that information as well. They both knew he wouldn’t give a straight answer if asked. 

“It’s okay to be afraid of me,” Kaname started, looking like he was mourning their tentative relationship already, “it must be scary to have this sort of information.”

Yuuki stood up and walked to Kaname’s side of the table. “I’m not afraid of you,” She slid down and reached forward to brush his hair out of his eyes, slow enough for even a human to move away if they wanted. “I know you won’t hurt me. Thank-you for taking care of me so much.”

Oh, he looked like he was going to tear up. Yuuki wasn’t good with crying children. In fact, she said those things in an effort to _not_ make him so sad. If she knew he was beyond the point of comfort, she would have said what was really on her mind:

_Silly boy, how can I fear someone who looks like they would break if I bled?_

\---

O

\---

Kaien was someone else when he practiced forms. Not tou-san, not gakuchou-sensei, someone who held the title of ‘vampire hunter’. The spell only broke when he caught her gaze in the mirrors and flashed a goofy smile. 

The basement was no longer forbidden to Yuuki, allowing her to watch Kaien whenever he worked out. He _did_ change the lock to the door to prevent other babysitters from snooping inside. ‘It’s my fault anyways, for using the same lock as the academy doors.’ Keiko had misused her powers as upper-level student council treasurer to use her own keys to enter the basement. Although, besides a warning comment of ‘make sure to stay out of the basement, okay?’ delivered with a chilly smile when she showed up for babysitting duties, Kaien didn’t seem to take any disciplinary measures. 

‘Keiko-san is curious to a fault, but not for malicious purposes. She’s used to being in the know, even though she won’t ever be out on the field.’

The Ichinose family were ‘in the know’ and a part of the community, but they weren’t actually fighters. Keiko and Masao wouldn’t become vampire hunters and neither would Yuuki. Kaien had made a face when she asked. 

‘Wouldn’t it be better if you lived a lifetime of bringing vampires and humans closer together?’

Yuuki didn’t care to risk her life being a hunter in the first place. Staying weak was a different matter. Even though it made sense and resolved some of her uncertainty in the reality she was now in, knowing vampires existed felt a little too ‘paranormal-romance young adult novel’ for her. For some reason, the situation she was in felt very stereotypical. 

Kaien wiped his sweaty face with a towel and started on cooldown exercises. From a superficial glance, he was way too young to be a headmaster. Ah, the rejuvenating effects of regular exercise. “Aren’t you bored watching me, Yuuki-chan?”

“No, it’s like watching television.” It also gave her a chance to think. What were the logistics of being a vampire in a world that made sense? Why was Kaien once a vampire hunter and why did he stop? Would she have to start going through puberty in a few years?

He hesitated then asked, “Would you like to try some aikido? You won’t ever have to use it in practice, but it can be beneficial.”

“...okay.” She couldn’t stop the shy smile from forming.

\---

O

\---

It wasn’t that Yuuki didn’t like her birthdays. This, however, was her _sixth_ birthday. The last birthday she celebrated, she went out drinking with friends. Now, she didn’t even know the words for ‘black-out drunk’.

“Say ‘cheers’, Yuuki-chan,” Kaien said, snapping a photo of her with the flowers Eriko placed in her hair.

Flowers bloomed rarely in winter. Fortunately, the academy garden area had a winter section, full of narcissi and peonies. Winter there, to Yuuki, was relatively mild, despite the dusting of snow on the ground. The water of the ‘moat’, which bordered one third of the gardens, remained unfrozen. The second third of the garden’s edge bled into the Forest of a Green Saint, whose giant trees still held onto their green leaves. Lastly stood the main dining hall in the distance, outdoor seating vacant of lunch-goers. 

“Yuuki-chan looks really cute in her new winter outfit,” Eriko said. 

Mori muttered an agreement, while staring at Eriko herself, who had put a narcissus in her own hair. ‘Young love,’ thought Yuuki, then mentally gagged. The days they babysat her were treated like movie date nights and Kaien had _terrible_ taste in romance films.

Naoki turned around the sketch book he gifted Yuuki, “Look, I drew all of us.”

‘Drew’ was a generous statement. There were eight stick figures of varying height and a creature with pointy ears. Presumably Daedala, despite her being not allowed outside. They all circled bold letters reading ‘Happy 6th Birthday, Kurosu Yuuki :)’. 

“Harimoto-san, did you just use the present you gave Yuuki for yourself?” Kaien asked. He had a smile on, but he had been smiling every time Yuuki looked at him this morning. It might have gotten stuck that way. 

“It’s still a gift! It’s a birthday card!”

Yuuki had received more than a few presents, considering her limited social circle. For children of the elite, perhaps it wasn’t so strange to give things to the daughter of the academy headmaster. From Naoki she had a large sketch book and Shizuko’s gift of drawing pencils complemented it. The Ichinose siblings gave her cat materials; a large teddy bear was presented to her by the ‘love pair’. Kaien topped the list with new clothing. Lots of pink, frilly, girlish clothing. 

She stayed quiet as the topic turned to classes. The argument of ‘Mori-kun, how could you fail history?!’ and ‘It’s not failing, I’m just barely passing,’ changed to ‘Shizuko-chan, doesn’t that guy in class Y like you?’ and ‘Why do you want to know?’. There was a lull after a comment of ‘Fukura-sensei is so annoying. He’s like---’ with Kain’s reply of ‘What is he like, Ichinose-kun?’ met with ‘...Nothing.’.

The far-off silhouettes of students crossing the Sky Gate and entering the school area of the academy signalled lunch would soon come to an end. The school portion, which held class buildings, the gardens, and the groundskeeper house, was sectioned off from the residency portion, which held the dormitories, staff quarters, and minor chapels, by a combination of a river, the forest, and an island. The coldly intimidating main chapel stood as its lone structure.

“Gakuchou-sensei,” Shizuko started, “are you ever going to remove the Miracle Chapel from the island? The school is secular now, so it shouldn’t even be there.”

Kaien gazed at the building in question, “A part of the academy’s grandeur is from its age and historic buildings. I’m restricted to making only additions and interior renovations.” A teasing light entered his eyes, “Why? You don’t like the entrance ceremonies there? I’m hurt.”

“No, no! It was only a question.”

“Is that why the Sunburst Chapel is still near the dormitory? Even though no one can enter,” asked Keiko.

Kaien made a noise of confirmation. 

“But isn’t it dangerous?” added Mori. “Surely they’d let you take it down for that reason.”

Kaien glanced at Yuuki, “It’s _not_ dangerous. No one had been in there for a century, so the infrastructure is simply too old for people to walk around in.”

“Why does Mori-kun think it’s dangerous?” Yuuki could tell that was the exact question Kaien didn’t want her to ask.

“I’m not _scared_ , if that’s what you’re thinking. There’s just some rumours of a ghost.”

“Long ago, “ Masao eagerly added, “a student disappeared there. And then---”

“You guys should be packing up,” Kaien interrupted, a touch of firmness in his voice, “the lunch period is ending.”

Masao shut his mouth with an audible click.

\---

There was one person left to visit within her small set of cohorts. He came some time after dinner. 

‘Happy birthday, Yuuki,’ was probably what Kaname intended to say, however he only got as far as ‘Happ--’ before being cut off with Yuuki’s hug. After she learned of vampires, Yuuki made sure to change their relationship to not be so full of fear on Kaname’s end. Step 2: Physical Affection, came after Step 1: Words of Appreciation. Whatever he was doing, he probably wasn’t getting enough hugs. The sparse words he spoke about the Ichijo estate indicated touch wasn’t a casual affair. Child-like behavior and needs such as that occasionally came from Kaname, which she indulged (it _definitely_ didn’t come from Yuuki).

The disadvantage to initiating Step 2 came from Kaien loving to hug her. It wasn’t that she hated his touch, rather hugging an obvious adult revealed the blatant fact she still lived in a child’s body. 

The clicks of Kaien’s camera brought the moment to an end. 

Kaname’s gift was a calligraphy set. It seemed too refined to give to an average six year old. Then again, was she really a six year old? On this day, everybody was telling her so. 

The dining room was silent as she thought about it. Kaien holed himself up in his office, doing all the work he put off during Yuuki’s day celebration, and Kaname didn’t mind the quiet. His maturity clashed with his age, but his naivety didn’t suit an adult. They weren’t the same. Kaname wasn’t a shapeshifter, a _possessor_ , a pretenderlike the being inside Yuuki was. He was the closest person she had for an equal, though. 

Gone were her friends, her brother, her parents. She was a stranger to this reality and to this new child-self she was becoming. Kaname, sharp-eyed as he was, noticed the misty quality of her eyes. Or maybe he smelled the sadness blooming within her. 

“What are you thinking about?”

“My family,” she might have only mouthed it, unable to hear it with her own ears. Yet Kaname shifted as if he heard. “Can we go outside? It feels…” ( ~~oppressive,~~ ~~confining, overwhelming,~~ nope, don’t know those words either) “...bad in here.”

The cool wind dried her beginning tears. They walked far enough to reach the stone fountain and Yuuki sat at the edge. _Goddess of Mercy: Kannon_ read the plaque under the central statue. Nighttime was different when it was with Kaname. All the buildings in the distance dissolved into mist and they were standing on that snow field again, watching the remains of a vampire mix with the snowflakes. 

“Do you remember your parents?” she asked. 

Kaname shifted, “A little. Chichi-ue was very generous and haha-ue was devoted.”

“I remember a little of my family,” pulling her legs up to her chest, Yuuki continued, “but not everything. I know something bad happened, but my head doesn’t want to remember.” Oh no, the tears were coming back now. She pressed her hands to her eyes, “I can’t even honor their deaths with a memory.”

Kaname called her name and said nothing else. What could he say? What could anyone say? The warmth of his arms around her didn’t stave off the cold. 

\---

O

\---

“This just might be the best time in our lives,” declared Shizuko.

Keiko scoffed, “Maybe _you’ve_ peaked, but I still have a life ahead of me.”

“What could be better,” Shizuko theatrically went on, “than lounging in the sun, surrounded by historical buildings, and having your likeness immortalized in art?”

“ _Immortalized_ ,” Mori drew out the word, “by a twerp.”

The twerp in question focused on her sketch of the five figures by the fountain. While a beautiful background, capturing flowing water on paper made her regret her choice of setting. The image that was coming to fruition before her was far from Yuuki’s usual skill in her other body, but then again, she had only drawn subjects captured through an HD lens.

Acting as if she never heard any dissent, Shizuko said, “We need to do something before this spring season of our youth runs dry.”

“And I bet that _something_ will be big and flashy,” Eriko replied flatly. “You really _do_ belong in the drama club.”

Turning his head up to see Shizuko, who was laying on the fountain edge he was seated against, Naoki added, “Didn’t Amano-san say not to pull anything after Tsukuda’s prank?”

Shizuko sat up at that remark. Thankfully Yuuki had already drawn the pair and was just finishing up Eriko, sitting primly to the side.

“Amano-san is the upper-level _president_. Not only does she work for work for The Man, she _is_ The Man.”

When Mori mockingly repeated her words, Shizuko stood up on the ledge. The back and forth between them was interrupted by a ‘fuck!’ and splashes. ‘Well,’ thought Yuuki, ‘at least most of the picture was done.’

\---

They moved to the art plaza, located, naturally, near the art buildings, to sit on the warm stone path and wait for Mori and Shizuka’s shoes and socks to dry. The sculptures surrounding them held a disjointed mix of student experimental and traditional western and eastern styles. _Goddess of Music: Benzaiten_ read the nearest statue depicting a woman holding a lute. 

“This is the last year where we will still be free,” said Shizuko, poking her damp sock. “Are we really going to go out with a whimper? When I start working for my family, I won’t have much time.”

In contrast, Yuuki’s time would be much more free than it had already been. A constant cycle of sleeping and studying awaited her once graduation came. She only cared so much for books because knowledge was power. Even to her, reading could get boring, however Kaien became really concerned when she stayed in bed for more than twelve hours. If it wasn’t for the new habit of drawing, staring at the wall would have been the only way for her to destress.

“I know what you mean,” Eriko muttered, “after I graduate, I’ll be engaged to a man I never met.”

Yuuki looked at Mori, whose head was down. She supposed that was why the pair stopped babysitting her together. 

“Arranged marriages are standard for the elite. That doesn’t mean you can’t have lovers,” Naoki said. 

Yuuki, Keiko, and Eriko looked at him.

“...eh? Was it not correct?”

Keiko sighed, “It’s true, but if your future wife hears that from you…”

Glancing at Shizuko, Naoki changed topics, “At least we’ll be going to the same university?”

Uncertain silence met his words. 

\---

O

\---

The newly bought dictionary was a much needed raft to traverse an ocean of unknowable words. So what if Yuuki could barely handle the weight of it? Kaien had merely chuckled when she tried to carry the book out of the store. She ended up holding his hand while he held the dictionary. In the end, she had only needed to drag it up to her room so she could find a book from Kaien’s study alone. 

Gone were the days of simple sentences and weak storylines! Yuuki now had… child psychology books, test studies on educational development, and dramatic romance novels?? She couldn’t help the disappointed ‘tsk’ from coming out when she looked at the third option. Oddly enough, the feeling brought about a sense of remembrance. Her childhood friend had the same taste in genre, except it was with comics and cartoons. 

The personal library of an adult wasn’t nearly as exciting as she remembered. 

On the other hand, Yuuki now had the familiarity and audacity to climb on the shelves (or first the desk chair, then the shelves) in order to get a closer look at the map. Seeing the five great land masses instead of seven didn’t surprise her as it would have if she properly viewed it the first day she entered the house. The dimension she travelled to assumed the familiarity of her original home, but didn’t contain the foundational details. As if someone decided the end results, but left the path to get there up to chaos. Or, time and war ravaged both natural and cultural landscapes to such an extent, the progression, death, and stagnation of inventions were different from her own time. 

Why else would _flip phones_ still be popular?

The upper shelves showcased a few ornaments and photos along with notebooks. It seemed like Kaien was _that_ type of person, who kept all their notes from university. She aimlessly flipped through a sapphire-colored book.

_...oh?_

Kaien was pretty good at anatomy drawings. One page revealed a sharp-lined drawing of the heart’s chambers. The next-- fangs. Yuuki squinted. She had a feeling those notes weren’t from any ordinary tertiary education. After also taking the next notebook on the pile, another blue one, Yuuki hopped down, placed the chair back, and went to the dictionary. 

\---

Vampires, humans, and hunters had very similar anatomical structures, right up until the head, heart, and ‘unknown’ system. That ‘unknown’ word couldn’t be found in the dictionary. What it described through diagram and description looked to be a mix of the nervous and lymphatic system. 

The destruction of the head or heart with an anti-vampire weapon. That was how one killed a vampire, save for sunlight. 

_If the condition is not met, even a Level E will still live. The limbs might be detached, chest cavity pulled open, and mind gone to insanity, however the beat of the heart and pulse of the brain will continue (see Tityus Case Study)._

Yuuki shut the notebook. That sentence wasn’t dramatic prose on a younger Kaien’s part; it was done to a person and results were recorded, submitted for review, and published. ‘No, not to humans,” she thought, ‘to vampires. Hunters likely don’t see vampires as full people.’

Except for Kaien, who dearly wished for peace. 

_Would the hunters allow that?_

She opened the other notebook, then took a double take at the date on the first page. Yuuki looked at the date of the first book. Next, she checked the date of the calendar on her desk. Unless Kaien was over a hundred years old, the notebooks weren’t originally his. Why would he keep the notes of a generation before, unless information with the hunter community was that tightly controlled?

Yuuki felt her nails dig into her palms. She had so desperately strived to learn the language and gain some semblance of control, of power. Why was it the more she knew, the more she realized how _little_ she was? The world was dangerous, she had known that since she was young. However, she had lived the privilege of never really experiencing it. Would she have the fortunate luck of being that sheltered this time around? When the first memory of this body was…

\---

O

\---

Kaname’s best virtue was patience. The students moved too much even when they tried to stay still. Kaien would make silly poses when he caught her with her sketchbook out. Yuuki could swear Daedala knew when she was being drawn and would move on purpose. Kaname was docile and could stare into space for an hour without moving a muscle. One time, she simply stared at him, pencil hand still, and he didn’t comment until five minutes later.

Yuuki gained the niche ability to draw one specific individual rather well. 

Sunlight crawled too quickly towards its end. She knew it would take multiple sessions to draw Kaname outside with natural lighting that didn’t hurt his skin, but recreating the setting would be a pain. The placement of autumnal leaves in his hair was _very_ specific. In spring, Yuuki decided he would wear a flower crown. Maybe she could even cajole him into a dress. He looked androgenous enough for that.

When she finished the outline, the growing shadows were too dark to continue. 

“I’m done for now, Kaname. It’s really nice how we can be quiet like this.”

“Usually, I’m told the opposite,” he replied, shaking the leaves off his head.

Yuuki packed up the art materials, “Being the quiet friend of the group isn’t bad.”

Jealousy was petty and _childish_ , yet more often than not she had to push it down when she remembered Kaname had friends of his own age group. Friends he took lessons with and who wouldn’t graduate from the academy and his life within half a year. She still had Masao when the year ended. His rough exterior prevented him from getting along with his own classmates, so he wasn’t adverse to being with his sister’s circle of friends along with their babysitting duties. If only she had a sibling, it wouldn’t be so bad. Although there was the feeling she would end up being more of a mother figure than sister. 

“It’s just because they’re too loud. Can I see it?” Kaname gestured towards the pad.

Despite the hesitation, she showed him. Her lack of formal training showed clearly through the smudges and rough lines. When she got better, Yuuki would draw what she recollected of her family. 

“Do you have any hobbies, Kaname?”

“I study a lot,” he said, as they walked back to the groundskeeper’s house, hand in hand.

“Eh? That’s not a hobby.”

Kaname looked to the side, “That’s what they said as well. But don’t you have an entire shelf of workbooks?” Using Yuuki’s answering silence as a moment to ponder, he relented, “I like tea. It’s nice to drink at Aido’s rose garden.”

“You’re very refined. Keep in mind it’s okay to do messy things once in a while.”

“I could say the same for you.”

Naturally, the next time they met, it would be after Yuuki had involved herself in _that_ mess.

\---

_Vampires usually mean romance and drama. Why does this feel more like a horror novel?_


	3. Old Lives on Your Mind

“Are you trying to steal something?”

“W-what?”

He likely wasn’t, but Mori’s wide-eyed look of surprise clearly indicated he was trying to do _something_ suspicious. He and Shizuko weren’t discreet in their conversation of ‘I can’t find it,’, ‘how hard could it be?’, and ‘then _you_ look for it’.

Yuuki set down her mathematics book, “You guys keep going into gakuchou-sensei’s office. Should I be worried?”

“No, it’s really nothing,” Shizuko waved it away. “Say, Yuuki-chan, do you know where your otou-san keeps his keys?”

Narrowing her eyes, Yuuki replied cautiously, “Why do you want to know?”

“...Do you know how to keep a secret, Yuuki-chan?”

She nodded solemnly. 

“We’re going to celebrate Halloween with a scary movie night at the perfect place: the ~haunted~ Sunburst Chapel,” Shizuko took Yuuki’s shoulders. “That’s why we need the key to that place.”

Yuuki hummed in thought, “Wouldn’t it be better to do it during Obon?”

“We don’t have _time_ to wait for next year to do it then. Besides,” Shizuko gestured vaguely, “this school used to celebrate Christmas, why not Halloween?”

“Shizuko-san is really desperate to do something big,” Mori ignored the glare directed his way with a smile aimed at Yuuki. “Do you think you could help us?”

Reluctantly, Yuuki nodded, “I think I know where they are, but I want to check out the chapel too.”

Shizuko pulled back, “I don’t think so. It’s a super scary place, you’ll get nightmares.”

“I’m not scared,” the whiny, high-pitched tone of her voice ruined the effect. “Even if someone died there, I won’t be afraid.”

“A person didn’t die _there_. They just disappeared. Are you really not going to tell us?” said Mori. 

_If not there, then where_ did _a person die?_ They didn’t look willing to go into details around Yuuki. Willing to scare their classmates in a haunted building, unwilling to scare a six year old. When was her age ever not a block in the road?

“If you guys don’t think you need my help, that’s fine.”

\---

They ended up needing Yuuki’s help.

If only Shizuko and Mori were astute enough to check behind the framed map in Kaien’s study. That was fine. Yuuki probably wouldn’t have found out that was where he kept the uncommon keys if not for seeing him switch out the basement keys. And now she got a field trip to a place she’d never been before: past the island. 

The world of Kurosu Yuuki was irritatingly small. Perhaps it was normal for children whose parents worked from home. Perhaps not. The only times she went past the gates of the academy was to visit the shopping district in the hunter town. The one time Yuuki suggested taking holiday after seeing a beach on the television, Kaien quickly changed the topic. She’s safe if people think Kaien’s her biological father. She’s _safe_ if her birdcage is as small as possible. Safe from what? 

Yuuki, riding on the back of Mori, passed the Sky Gate with its bridge to meet the main chapel. In the full moon, its presence bore down on them like a midnight beast.

Mori shut off his flashlight and waited a moment, “We have to see by moonlight now, so the professors don’t see us,” he adjusted his hold on her and felt the key ring grasped in her right fist. “You’re _sure_ these are for the chapels?”

“Its label said: CHAPELS. So, yes.”

It had been too easy to climb up on the shelves, grab the keys, and then walk out the door. _My, my, Kaien. If your ‘daughter’ ever wanted to run away, there wouldn’t be obstacles._ She filed that information away for later. 

They went to the north-eastern corner of the island, crossed the Sunrise Gate and the bridge, and officially entered the dormitory area. At least, half of it. The other half was disused and separated by a lake. The Moon Dormitory once belonged to female students and the Sun Dormitory, the males. Now, living quarters were coed. They walked past two large buildings, presumably the dormitory itself and the staff quarters. 

Two figures waited at the door of the Sunburst Chapel. It was smaller than expected, seemingly one or two rooms at ground level. 

“Do you have the keys, Mori-kun?” came Shizuko’s voice.

“Did you really have to bring Yuuki-chan?” Keiko’s whisper followed after. 

Yuuki answered with the jingling of the key ring. “I won’t touch anything; I promise.”

Keiko tapped her on the nose and took the keys. “But you _will_ tell gakuchou-sensei about this, just like you told him I went into the basement.”

Technically, Yuuki didn’t _tell_. Kaien _found out_ , when he noticed she put the horror films back. 

The second key unlocked the door. Trepidatiously, the four of them entered, turning back on their lights. 

Mori sneezed, “Damn, this place is dusty.”

“It’s remarkably well preserved,” Keiko walked on the creaking floorboards. “If we get some cleaning supplies, put blankets on the benches… Don’t you guys think it’d be pretty cool for a movie viewing?”

“A _scaary_ film fest,” said Shizuko to Mori, who scowled. 

There _was_ a tense vibe in the room, but only because it was dark and the quiet continuously became disrupted by each step of the students. Although not overly familiar, Yuuki had seen the insides of churches and chapels before. Besides the filth, there was nothing disturbing. 

However, that didn’t stop Mori’s hairs from standing on end and his hands holding Yuuki’s legs from becoming clammy. Each crack and cobwebbed rafter was examined with their flashlights. Detailed carvings revealed a story which had been left to dust. 

Nothing happened, but Mori’s breathing grew quicker, shallower. Yuuki wanted to whisper something like ‘nothing scary is happening’ or ‘boo!’, yet if she did that, he would surely jump and throw her from his back out of fright. 

Shizuko and Keiko stood on the pulpit, looking up at the effigy of the crucifixion. It wasn’t a painted carving, just deep brown along with the cross. The man fastened to it hung his head to the side and showed off his skeleton figure, as if the Romans had starved him and let him waste on the cross until flesh and structure were intertwined. Maybe the hundred-year air had changed the effigy from the beauty it once was, because the light gave strange shadows and curves. In one blink, it could have not been a model handcrafted by an aging artist, but rather a branch washed up on the shore which had the curiosity of a man’s face reaching out of the wood. A spirit put into a physical form. 

When Mori joined the girls, Keiko opened her mouth to speak.

_...ccrreeAACKK_

Yuuki felt a sensation of weightlessness before jarring impact with stone and Mori’s body. She heard the broken floorboards have their own introduction with the ground as well as two ‘thump’s of Shizuko and Keiko. 

One of them cursed while Yuuki pushed at Mori’s shoulders to get him off her. 

“What just happened?” Keiko said and looked up.

Mori stood up and tried to reach up towards the hole in the ceiling, “We just ruined our chance for going out with a bang.”

“Maybe,” started Shizuko, “we can just tell people to move around the giant hole we created.” She didn’t sound convinced. 

“I can’t get up myself, but if one of you girls got on my shoulders you could probably do it,” Mori said. 

Keiko sighed, “We’ll probably just break more of the floor trying to pull ourselves up. Unless Yuuki-chan’s light enough to get up and then get some help.”

“Have her run out in the middle of the night?” said Shizuko, “How about we don’t involve the teachers and just find the stairs?”

They had fallen down into a hallway. To the left were two doors at the front and three doors at the back. The right had one door at the front, two at the back, and one at the end of the hall. That one was locked. 

Keiko didn’t move after finding the doorknob wouldn’t budge, none of them did. They were unified by the thought which flashed in one mind to the other like electricity: ‘are we stuck down here forever?’

“The stairs are probably behind another door,” said Shizuko. 

They should have immediately looked at the front doors. Instead, they opened the back doors one by one, finding the same room in each. A bed. Nothing else, save for the occasional stains on the sheets.

“Why does--”

“Shut up,” Mori said.

“Why. Does,” Keiko repeated. “This look like a prison.”

“Or a mental asylum,” said Shizuko under her breath.

“I don’t need you guys freaking me out,” Mori said, without the heat in his voice from earlier. “Please stop.”

The first front door contained what Yuuki recognized as an autopsy table with straps. They moved on without comment. Larger than the others, the final room was an office. 

“What the hell? There’s so much dust in here. Cover your mouth and nose with your jacket, Yuuki-chan,” ordered Shizuko. 

The students spread out, opening cabinets and desk drawers. Yuuki looked at the dust piles. Pompeii. If she tilted her head, they could look like the white-ashen bodies in Pompeii had turned black from sitting in the dark for a century. Yuuki paused at the thought. Ash? No, the blue notebooks said that-- She crouched and looked closer. They were bigger and harder than normal dust particles, like rocks. Sand.

The notes read that vampires dissolved to _sand_.

Yuuki’s legs gave out and she fell. Right on the dead vampire. The black sand figure collapsed like how a charred body might break into little pieces. Fire. That was how her parents died. 

_They’re making us watch mom and dad’s immolation_. The bodies burn like chicken charring on the grill. Because the cultists shaved them beforehand, there is nothing to distract the scent of burning meat and smoke. Except, maybe, the screaming. She can only look at her brother’s face. They don’t deserve what’s happening, but this is what he gets. What he brought unto them. If only he didn’t---

The smell of flesh to the fire. A food offering to their god. 

“Ah? Yuuki-chan, are you okay?”

She was suddenly standing up and letting Keiko try to wipe off the sand with her white jacket. The sleeve grew darker and darker. Like charcoal, the remains were leaving smudged stains. 

Mori picked her up, Yuuki couldn’t move beyond shaking otherwise. 

“We have the key, let’s just get out of here.”

\---

“This feels a little reminiscent, don’t you think, Yuuki-chan?” Kaien said as he washed the ~~blood~~ vampire sand from her body in the bathroom.

His smile was both disappointed and more forced than usual. Guilt clawed at Yuuki’s throat. Their group had climbed the stairs of the Sunburst Chapel, walked out of a side room, and met the surprised faces of a pair of adults. When the floor broke, Shizuko dropped her flashlight in such a way, the light shone through the door and out to the wilderness, where people were alerted. Kaien had just looked at her with an unreadable expression after he came to get her. 

Yuuki reached out and touched Kaien’s cheek to get his attention. Oops, he hadn’t cleaned that hand yet. Maybe he wouldn’t notice she had stained his face.

“I want to get tou-san to smile more.”

“You don’t think I do it enough?”

“A lot of them aren’t genuine.”

Kaien’s face became pensive. He started on cleaning the other arm.

Yuuki continued, “Who told you to smile even when your feelings aren’t the same? It’s better to only do it when you feel happiness.”

“But then I’d become as serious-looking as Yuuki-chan.”

“...That’s true. I’m sorry for being bad.”

Kaien might not have wanted her, but he tried his best. Education, food, conversation, shelter, hugs. She hadn’t been very good at repaying his kindness. One shitty drawing for his birthday didn’t cut it in any sense.

He sighed, “It was only an accident. When I saw you, covered in sand, after being woken up at two in the morning… I guess it’s a feeling a parent would have.”

Yuuki waited until Kaien started brushing out her hair to speak, “Do you think Keiko-san recognized what it is?”

She counted thirty breaths until he replied, “You know, sometimes it doesn’t feel like I’m a parent. It’s more like… I’m back in my mentoring days.”

“Kaien is the best tou-san I have.”

That earned her a bitter chuckle, “The sand is very distinctive. Ichinose-san will call her parents if she’s curious about more,” he said. “What’s underneath some of the buildings here is one of the reasons certain places here are restricted and also why they can’t be torn away. This academy is built on bones and ghosts of vampire and hunter inventions. I would like to invent peace.”

Kaien stopped brushing, “There’s too much. I think we’ll need to cut it.”

Oh.

 _Oh no_.

\---

Kaien never specifically said the words ‘punishment’ or ‘discipline’. He didn’t have to. They both knew Yuuki’s freedom would be restricted. No one came to babysit her and she wasn’t allowed out of the house. Time ran backwards to the earlier days, when Kaien worked in his office and Yuuki had the television running in the background. At least there was Daedala.

She _tried_ to be a good daughter. Except, Yuuki didn’t quite know how to do that. With her parents, simply being their child felt enough. Gifts for holidays, doing the chores, achieving good grades. Small details on the foundation of love. Resentment and obligation tied Yuuki and Kaien together. She had so much to thank him for, not all of them met with positive feelings. Out of all the people she knew, he treated her the most like a child. Her body and practical side needed that. Needed to work on her language skills, to eat food, to have shelter. The young woman inside of her, which was growing fainter by day, _hated_ being so weak. 

Yuuki didn’t know Kaien’s mind, but she did know a man like him probably didn’t plan on having children, not unless they were with a lover. Something made him say ‘yes, I’ll let the world think this child is my own’. Obligation to what? Orphanages weren’t uncommon, nor badly run, from what the documentaries showed. The long series of wars in the last era made such institutions vital. 

Cool wind numbed Yuuki’s face. Sitting on the opened window sill of her room, she closed her eyes for a moment. Doing this too many times would make her sick, especially if it started to snow. For now, she stayed half-sleeping under the night, toying with the idea of leaving, even though she wouldn’t.

“Yuuki?”

Kaname stood under the window gazing up. He was almost a dream-figment, except Yuuki never dreamed about him. She opened the window further and shifted to the side. From a distance, she couldn’t make out his finer details. She knew, though, his head tilted just a centimeter. An ‘oh, I didn’t expect this, but I’ll allow it’. Yuuki didn’t see how Kaname jumped through the window, he was simply in the room.

“I can’t have visitors after a complication. You might not be allowed to be here.”

“Kurosu-san will let me,” came the confident reply.

Her room was under a microscope. Kaname’s eyes tracked everything: each book, pencil, and paper. The unmade bed, closed closet, cat teaser. Unframed photos scattered on her desk, calligraphy set next to them. What was his room like? Yuuki wouldn’t know. There seemed to be an unsaid rule that the mirror between their worlds was one-way. Kaname could look in, trace the painted poems she pinned to the wall, leave his black-stained imprint on her short life. When she died, Yuuki would be bone. Kaname’s death would leave shattered glass. 

“Your hair looks pretty.”

Yuuki felt herself frown before she could stop it. Apparently, vampire sand was nigh impossible to get out of long hair. Hunters kept their hair short for that reason unless they were skilled in avoiding killing vampires in a way which made the sand scatter around. Looking at her face in the mirror, hair to her shoulders, gave Yuuki a distinctly uncomfortable feeling.

“You didn’t like it long?”

“It’s not that,” came the immediate reply, “it was also pretty long.”

“Is there a hairstyle you wouldn’t like me in?” at the pause, she suggested, “bald?”

“You would still be pretty bald.”

Yuuki couldn’t suppress her smile, “It’s only because you’re a child, that you can get away with a cheesy line like that.”

“Is that so? Then I suppose it’s fortunate I’m so young,” said Kaname, the edge of amusement on his lips.

\---

O

\---

Time ran out before things could revert to the way they were. 

Yuuki’s restrictions were lifted by her birthday, which was a straightforward affair. They had a picnic by the lake, where the topic of _that_ incident didn’t hide itself. Trespassing to a restricted area past curfew and destruction of property earned Keiko, Shizuko, and Mori a phone call from their parents and extra classroom cleaning duties. Babysitting was always going to be removed from the seventh year students’ duties when the time for university exams came. 

The options for universities in the country left much to be desired. One in the capital, one in their prefecture, one near the sea. The people who received higher learning were usually the elite, while the common people pursued education as far as their towns allowed. 

Cross Academy was naturally available to only the top social class, with the exception of certain families in the neighboring town. 

The Ichinose family sat next to Yuuki during the graduation ceremony. A black-haired mother, a blond father, and a cousin, who couldn’t hide his sleeve tattoos well enough. When introduced, the mother looked at her with scrutinizing eyes. Yuuki stared back.

‘Ah, Kaien-san, she looks a bit like you, before your change of heart.’

Then, her world became smaller.

\---

O

\---

“You don’t have to hit so hard, Masao-kun.”

“Sorry.”

_THWUMP_

“Well done, Yuuki-chan,” came Kaien’s absent-minded reply as he looked over papers from the other side of the room. Since they were going through a routine, it didn’t need the attention of an actual spar. 

Masao’s grunt of pain was entirely exaggerated. Yuuki helped him off the mats anyways, although it was just for formalities. Despite her training, a seven year old body could not support a twelve year old boy entering his growth spurt. She could, however, redirect his energy and flip him to the ground. Masao’s type of fighting relied on using the strength of a tank, useless in a spar where he had to pull his punches. 

“Have you gotten taller? That sound of impact was a bit louder than average.”

Yuuki earned a half-hearted glare. She replied with a smile. 

These days were bearing the first fruits of self-improvement. Books were read with only moderate dictionary consultation, her fine motor skills refined themselves, cooking was an activity which could be done together by Kaien and Yuuki. The lacking aspect was her peer group, dwindling to Masao twice a week and Kaname once a month. 

“You shouldn’t talk so much when sparring,” Masao chided.

“I wouldn’t need to talk if you weren’t distracted by it.”

Whether they were going to become hunters or not, it seemed everyone within that ‘in-the-know’ group learned a bit how to fight. Thus, a lot of their time spent together involved the basement or Daedala. Yuuki won less than a quarter of their spars, tragically. 

“Being devious like that isn’t fair.”

“Fair? Coming from a yakuza?”

Masao rolled his eyes. It wasn’t a true statement. It also wasn’t false. The Ichinose family were one of the connections that helped the hunter community hide the bodies, metaphorically and literally. Money, blackmail, weapons, those things passed through the hands of the Ichinose before finding their way towards the buyer, whether human, hunter, or vampire. As a result, their ties with the yakuza, along with the hunters, were blood strong. 

At least, that was what she inferred from Masao’s vague comments, Kaien’s softened statements, and the gray notebook from the study, containing information on prominent families. 

“If we’re done here, let’s take a row around the lake.” Yuuki suggested.

“You mean _me_ row _you_ around the lake.”

“Naturally.”

\---

There were originally eighteen unique ‘strains’ of level A vampires. Now, seven remained. 

_Entirely different than humanity in both biological and mental processes… unemotional, untouched by time… feared, revered, despised… the destiny of each and every level A lay in being killed…_

‘How scary,’ Yuuki thought, as she read. ‘Why is it like that?’ Her original world had nothing like a true ‘vampire’. There were different types of hominins, long ago. None of those species had _powers_ , though. A supernatural element had to have involved itself. This prompted the question of other impossible creatures’ existence. Vampires? Werewolves? Faeries? Ghosts?

When she asked that question, Kaien had laughed. ‘There’s only vampires. Isn’t that enough?’ But _why_? Why 10,000 years ago? The wars which occurred during that time didn’t involve nuclear bombs or materials, which could cause rapid mutation. In fact, the era revolved around _recovering_ the land and people from the radiation which humans left 1,000 years prior. Of course, she couldn’t be sure about the information she had. Her history knowledge was gained through books and television created by people who didn’t know the existence of vampires. Perhaps she could ask someone very old, but that seemed unlikely as she was not a vampire herself and had little reason to mix with them. Kaname was too young to know anything. The Vampire Hunter Association might have records. Would they give her access to them? Not unless she integrated within their ranks and Kaien didn’t want that. 

Yuuki sighed and flipped through the notebook. It was a deep emerald green, instead of the blue ones she took the first few times, indicating the change in subject from biology to vampire types. The notes, while eye-opening, hinted at books, studies, and common knowledge she didn’t have. Asking Kaien might induce answers at the cost of revealing Yuuki had been reading the notebooks. She knew the material wasn't fit for children. The depraved actions of crazed level E vampires, widespread massacres by the Shirabuki family, intense experimentation done to consenting and nonconsenting hunter-turned-vampires, those things stripped innocence away like methylene. 

She might have had nightmares from what she read, if she hadn’t lived a previous life. Her dreams were scattered and scarce moments of when she was older: vague, chilling things which left her sweaty. Really of little issue, she had more problems with sleep paralysis. 

Her knowledge was too shallow and the way to gain information was locked. Because she was still a child.

She was still _weak_.

\---

Kaname brought a girl the next time he visited.

A very _pretty_ girl. 

In the fading light, her medium-length silver hair gave off a violet hue, matching her eyes. 

“Yuuki, this is Seiren. Seiren, introduce yourself.”

“I’m Seiren. Nice to meet you,” she gave a low bow after reciting the formal introduction. “I look forward to our relationship, Yuuki-sama.”

Yuuki’s heart was going to burst. She couldn’t handle the overflow of cuteness.

After returning the bow, she replied, “I, too, look forward to our relationship. Addressing me with such formality-- I’m not worthy of that. Just my name is fine.”

Seiren kept her eyes to the ground, “But how can I address Yuuki-sama with such casualness?”

Yuuki glanced at Kaname. What did he say to Seiren to make her like this? At the same time, she was thankful he brought her a new potential-friend. A girl, at that. It had been nearly a year since she had spoken with a female person, other than politely accepting compliments from passing old grandmothers in town. Kaien had given her more than one odd glance on the occasions she accidentally used ‘boku’. 

“If it’s like that, then can’t we compromise and use ‘aneki’?”

Seiren quickly looked up and met her gaze. Was it too straightforward? The girl in front of her looked not only physically a child, but had the shyness of one as well. Thus, sisterly feelings came out in full force. She would like to try to be the older sibling, for once. 

“I-it’s as aneki says.”

Yuuki couldn’t hide her pleased grin, “Sieren is very pretty. Don’t you think, Kaname?”

He tilted his head in affirmation. A smart boy like Kaname would know Yuuki’s attention rested solely on Seiren for today.

Despite positive feelings, Yuuki had difficulty adapting to the dynamic of the three of them. Usually, Kaname or her would start a conversation with an interesting subject or observation, they would speak, and then let a comfortable silence reign between them. They frequently discussed poems, Kaien, and lessons. 

Seiren was painfully shy, only speaking when spoken to at first. She rarely talked after Kaname did. Further on, she didn’t read many poems, didn’t know Kaien, and her lessons centered around--

“You’re learning Wing Chun?” Yuuki was sure she had stars in her eyes. “Perhaps, you would like to spar?”

“Not possible,” came Kaname’s immediate reply.

Yuuki looked at him. The relationship between Seiren and Kaname was obviously a sort of master-servant type. The vampire hierarchy didn’t involve her, a human who could treat him as an equal without the weight of decorum. That also meant, as an outsider it wasn’t her place to criticize what he allowed his people to do or not do. 

“Because she’s a vampire,” he explained, “she might hurt you.”

It wasn’t an overreaction. A vampire child could kill a grown man, much less the young body Yuuki currently had. Kaname gave the impression of possessing excellent control. She didn’t know about Seiren. 

“Then perhaps Seiren could only teach me some of what she’s learned.”

They looked to Seiren, whose eyes widened at the sudden spotlight. After exchanging glances with the two, she looked at the ground, soft pink dusting her cheeks. 

Yuuki backed down, “That’s something to be done another time. Do you like art, Seiren? Chichi, Kurosu Kaien, gave watercolors to me for my birthday.”

Personally, she wasn’t good at painting. Yuuki’s talent lay in picking up minute details and shadows for realistic drawings. Developing a unique artstyle beyond that wasn’t to her interest. She wouldn’t have described herself as artistic in her previous life, Yuuki simply fell into the hobby of drawing and calligraphy. She didn’t think video games and social media were advanced enough for her to go back to her previous pastimes. 

They set up the art supplies in the garden. The light of the hanging lamps didn’t allow enough clarity for Yuuki to paint from the scenery. Instead, she created a basic gradient color wheel. Seiren, who had vampiric eyesight, painted the purple moss phlox which surrounded them. 

“Is that a… moth, Kaname?”

Kaname paused at his work. Unless he were _really_ bad, Yuuki identified dark brown-red wings and antennae. It flew towards a white corner circle surrounded by watered-down black. 

“It’s supposed to be a butterfly.”

“Ah, I hope it goes well.”

“...”

\---

Seiren didn’t accompany Kaname the next time he visited, nor the session after that. 

“When are you going to bring Seiren again? It was fun to be with her.”

“She’s busy. Don’t you like being with me?”

“...You know, Kaname, jealousy creates character. Make sure you don’t have too much of a personality.”

\---

“Masao, you need to stop growing. Soon, you’ll end up taller than me,” Keiko accusingly pointed her coffee spoon at him. 

He smirked, “That’s the plan.”

“Please, stay a shortie like Yuuki-chan. She’s barely grown at all since I last saw her.”

The person in question scrunched her eyebrows and gave a stern look towards Keiko. It wasn’t fair she _still_ hadn’t hit puberty. Yuuki’s intimidation levels were in the negative, especially with her ruffled clothing and doll-like face. Having it pointed out that her feet didn’t touch the floor when she sat didn’t help.

Because Masao’s birthday landed on a Sunday, they were able to brunch together with Keiko in town. It was odd to see her out of uniform, wearing subdued, practical clothing. The cafe she picked was just the same: small and hidden away in the winding streets a ways past the shopping plaza. Inside, partitioned seating gave the suggestion of privacy. It was there Masao opened his presents: homemade candy from Yuuki and Kaien, and a phone from his parents, delivered by Keiko.

“I picked out the keychain charm, by the way,” Keiko said, smiling. 

The little green turtle was more elegant than feminine, but there was little doubt his sister got it to tease him. Conversation meandered from relaying well-wishes from relatives to daily life. Keiko’s studies were going well, her work in the family business consumed her time. Because of the initial heir’s inability to have children, the closest cousin, Keiko, suddenly started being prepped to take over. The lives of Masao and Yuuki were less hectic.

“But didn’t gakuchou-sensei ask you about that certain thing?” 

“Hmm? What thing?”

Keiko shook her head, “If he didn’t ask yet, then I won’t tell. It involves hunter business. I know he’ll talk about it with you and the others at school, so don’t worry.”

“How can I _not_ worry when you say something vague like that?” Masao pushed away his finished plate. 

“I wasn’t given all the details,” sighing, Keiko said, “Drop it. You’ll know next year for sure.”

Masao’s lips twisted petulantly. “Yuuki-chan, do you know what she’s talking about?”

She started to shake her head, then stopped. “We’re moving to the official headmaster’s residence. Maybe it has to do with that?”

Yuuki found it to be a curious decision, considering Kaien had always lived in the groundskeeper’s house before and after she arrived. Since she would be entering school in a couple years, surely he would feel a strong sense of loneliness in the larger residence, with only the cat to accompany him. The building was only slightly closer to the Sun Dormitory, standing at the other side of the lake, along with the unutilized Moon Dormitory. 

“If he’s just going to ask me to help move boxes…” Masao slumped. “Can you at least teach me how to do _that_ trick?”

At Keiko’s questioning look, he dug into his bag and produced a deck of cards.

“Oh, you’ve found you have the ability?”

Masao nodded and handed the deck to her. Keiko pushed aside her plate and coffee cup. 

Looking between them, Yuuki asked, “What trick? Magic?”

“In order to kill vampires, hunters have some psychic ability,” Keiko explained, shuffling the cards. “Nothing as flashy as a level B, fortunately or unfortunately. It mainly helps with sensing presences and predicting movement.” 

It didn’t sound like _anything_ , according to Yuuki. Hunters were extensively trained to deal with vampires, it’s natural they would pick up unconscious adaptations to fight them. Then again, elemental powers were supposed to be possible to level Bs and above, it wasn’t so unreasonable for hunters to have some gift. 

Yuuki watched as Keiko set down five cards, faces down. “Why is it fortunate the powers aren’t as strong as a level B?”

“Everyone hates vampires, some more than most. If we share too many characteristics with them, there’s the thought ‘are we also the bad guys?’, but,” Keiko met Yuuki’s gaze, “even if a hunter has a really long lifespan, they’re still a person.” She looked back to Masao, “Okay, tell me what they all are.”

Masao stared at the cards for over a minute, eyes shifting from one to the next, “Three of spades, three of… hearts, two of spades, seven of diamonds, and… a jack-- no, a queen of clubs.”

Keiko flipped them over to reveal: three of spades, five of spades, seven of diamonds, two of spades, jack of clubs. A three out of five could have been convenient luck. 

“Nice try,” she said. “Do it to me and I’ll give you some tips.”

Masao took the deck and reshuffled. Splitting it apart, he handed the top half to Yuuki, “Pick two cards and give them to me.”

Yuuki searched through the cards and picked the black joker and queen of clubs. 

“Alright,” said Masao, putting down Yuuki’s cards and three he picked, “ _You_ tell _me_ what they are.”

Keiko took longer than Masao, up to two minutes. Then, she quickly read out her predictions, tapping the cards, “Seven of spades, queen of clubs, joker, ace of hearts, ace of hearts. Tricky, you included a duplicate card.”

Masao turned them over to reveal exactly as Keiko indicated. 

“Did you see how I didn’t hesitate?” she asked. “Remember to keep calm, too. Even if it takes five minutes, the trick is in getting them correct, not quick.”

Yuuki voiced her confusion, “It’s just like that? You suddenly know?”

“More like you demand to know the answer and it tells you. Since Yuuki-chan is Kaien’s daughter, there’s a high chance you’ll have a talent for it once puberty hits,” said Keiko. A mischievous glint entered her eyes, “Speaking of puberty… Tell the truth, Masao-kun, don’t you want to perfect this trick in order to pick up girls or boys?”

He spluttered, “W-what? No. No!”

“Sure, I believe you.”

\---

Kaien liked listening to rock and metal music.

Yuuki would have pegged him for a peppy pop lover, given his taste in movies and books. On the other hand, he did own a collection of horror films. The radio on the ground floor could be heard from Yuuki’s room as she packed up the last of her day to day necessities. It had taken them a week to box everything but the heavy appliances. A moving company couldn’t be used because of the location and nature of some of the things in the house. Now, Kaien was downstairs with his _friends_ packing up and moving the furniture. 

Kaien had friends. Strange to think about. Without realizing it, Yuuki had fallen into the childish trap of thinking Kaien’s life revolved around her, because _her_ life depended and revolved around him. To be fair, he never mentioned an indigo-haired Momochi or scarred Fujibayashi. Yuuki rarely asked about his life. Well, that had to change. 

She left the full boxes and walked downstairs. The adults would get it when they went up to move everything upstairs anyways. Besides, her arms _hurt_ from yesterday’s training with Masao. The few moves Seiren taught them took a long time to get right, since neither Masao nor Kaien were skilled in the style. Seiren was _also_ learning jujitsu. Kaien had given her a soft veto when she suggested learning it. ‘Isn’t that too aggressive for Yuuki-chan? Wouldn’t it be preferable to learn tai chi?’

The adults had the ground floor cleaned out when she entered the office. Fujibayashi was idly laying on the floor while Momochi leaned against a wall, staring out the window. Kaien must have been taking the last box out to the moving van. 

Fujibayashi turned the radio off, “Is Yuusu-chan done upstairs?”

“It’s all packed up, Hunter-san.”

The moment Fujibayashi had entered the door, she commented on the smallness of the building, complimented Kaien’s taste in plants, and gave Yuuki a nickname. ‘Yuusu’, a combination of her forename and surname to mean ‘kind master’. ‘Because Yuusu-chan is too harmless-looking to be Kurosu-shishou’s daughter.’ Yuuki awarded a nickname in return, although Fujibayashi was pleased to have her obvious profession acknowledged. 

After Kaien came back, they ate an early dinner in the empty dining room. It was fully dark when they moved everything and set out necessary furniture in the cold headmaster’s residence. To finish things up, Hakkaisan Sake was brought out. 

“Not for you,” Momochi said, taking the bottle from Yuuki’s hand when she picked it up to read the label. 

The first thing Momochi did when he saw Yuuki was crouch down and say ‘So you’re Kaien-san’s daughter, huh? Who’s your mother?’. ‘Dead,’ she replied immediately. It was the only thing she could say; Yuuki had forgotten the other parent’s name on her birth certificate. Her reply forced out choked laughter on Kaien’s part and a frown from Momochi. ‘Brat, that’s not what I asked for.’

The atmosphere loosened with the alcohol. Yuuki stayed silent, blending in with the floor and becoming a fly, overhearing Kaien’s relaxed conversation with his friends. He didn’t smile a lot, even with them. _Good, that means I didn’t reduce his joy when I entered his life_. When Kaien did smile, it was a kind, delicate thing. 

He had that same smile at night, as they lay in their respective futons, staring at the other. Daedala could be heard in the background, prowling the moonlit room. It had been a hectic day for her. 

“Tou-san looks like he had fun today.”

“I suppose it felt fun to have a big event like that.”

“It was a very familial atmosphere,” Yuuki said. “Do we-- you not have any other family?”

Her own family hadn’t been large, but her parents drilled the importance into her head since young. Kaien didn’t seem to hold onto that idea. What he thought about this or that, what he liked or disliked doing, did Yuuki have any idea? Nearly half a decade of living with someone, what did she know?

Kaien let out a sigh, “My parents died a long time ago and they only had me. There could be some remnants of a branch clan out there, but the relationship wouldn’t be stronger than any other hunter family.”

“Was my… other family a hunter one? Keiko-san thought I would have some psychic ability because…”

Because Yuuki was Kaien’s daughter. Except, that wasn’t true. They were, instead, a stranger who took in a child-mimic one snowy day. 

Kaien was quiet long enough Yuuki thought he had deliberately ignored her question to fall asleep. His sudden voice made her heart race in anticipation.

“I,” he started, “don’t really know. About the ability. If you have it or if you don’t, that’s fine with me. Yuuki-chan is great the way she is.”

If Kaien said something about her family, Yuuki didn’t hear before she was sound asleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had this chapter and next chapter (which introduces Zero) already written when I posted chapter 2, but school and other hobbies took away any interest or energy in fanfiction for while. Looking back on what I've written, I have a heavy focus on world-building and original characters. Would you guys be more interested if I introduced other canon (vampire) characters? If so, who?


	4. You Missed the Stains of the Past

It was as sharp and bright as the feeling of firecrackers going off in her mind. Yuuki’s thoughts scattered like sand in a desert storm the moment she lay her eyes on Zero.

Perhaps she should have noticed it the moment she opened her eyes. When she met Kaname, when she was called Yuuki. Cross Academy. Kaien. Surely, wouldn’t she have realized after she asked about the reconstruction in the Moon Dormitory? How the upper level uniforms switched to the same black as the lower level? So many details she brushed off as being clichés instead of specifics.

For all his distinctions, there was nothing _distinctive_ about Kaname: another high ranking, dark-haired vampire with a tragic past. Kaien’s presence in the anime was a shadow, nothing like his presence in _her_ life. _That show_ never mentioned a Keiko or Masao. But _Zero_. 

The first time she, who had rarely liked anime, saw him on the screen, she had _laughed_ and called him an edgy teen Sephiroth. The name of his _gun_ was like an emo MySpace username. The ‘Uchiha Sasuke’ for Supernatural fans. And then, her friend smacked her with a pillow, valiantly defending his honor. ( _ ~~What was my friend’s name again?~~_ )

That girl who was high on the laughter of her own bad jokes, laying on her friend’s bed and scoffing at some anime boy on the laptop’s screen-- Yuuki wanted to be her. She no longer recognized her in the mirror, didn’t speak the same way as her, didn’t look like her, but, _oh_ , Yuuki wanted that skin back. The feeling of loss and confusion tightened her insides like every particle of air was vacuumed out of her body. Yuuki was so very small looking at Zero, who had just lit a match to burn the papier-mâché battlements of her ignorance. She was growing smaller by the second, meeting his eyes and breathing the same air as _something_ not _real--_

The lights in the receiving room shattered. 

(It seems she _did_ have some ESP after all)

After the initial shock and bewilderment, Kaien and Momochi shuffled the three of them into the living room while they had a muffled conversation in the hall. Well, if Yuuki pressed her ear to the door she would look rude to her guests. It was doubtful she would hear anything anyways. 

She didn’t want to look at them, so Yuuki kept her eyes to her clasped hands in her lap as she sat opposite the boys. Much of the furniture they were sitting on was new, to fill up such a large space. She helped Kaien design nearly every room that the previous headmaster left empty. They probably weren’t going to stain the pale couch, the blood on their clothing looked too dry. 

_That_ event likely happened over four hours ago, since it was around ten in the evening Kaien received a call and went rushing out. ‘I have to help some people at the association, so just stay here, okay?’ Yuuki had watched the rest of the movie alone. 

In the anime, a white-haired pureblood massacred the Kiryu family, taking one twin and leaving the other a vampire. So why was it, Yuuki was sitting across _two_ traumatized boys before her?

Was she or was she not in a fictional world? The characters seemed right, the events and personalities weren’t as Yuuki remembered. It could entirely be the fault of her own memory. It had been so long in the first place, and when she thought about certain topics a wall would come up. Yuuki didn’t even read the manga series. Just the ending, because that friend had been _so mad_ with how the final arc concluded. 

Was she or was she not utterly fucked? Yuuki, because she wasn’t (original) Yuuki at all, had or will mess/ed up the destined timeline. Discomfort blossomed at the thought. She wasn’t a trail-blazer, a trendsetter, a fate-wrecker. Going against the grain rubbed her in the wrong direction. Like an utterly boring person, she had planned on following the life-script to a ‘T’ in her previous life and had planned on following it as ‘Yuuki’. School, university, job, family, death. In the end, that ‘death’ phase had come earli--- ( _Don’t, don’t think about it._ ). Was she, in fact, supposed to be doing something else, _being_ someone else? She couldn’t be anyone else but herself., but what _was_ herself and what **should she have been**? 

A sound of an opening door made the three of them startle. 

Momochi came in and looked at them. 

“...Talkative, aren’t you all?”

He sat next to Yuuki, relaxed and spread out like he wasn’t dealing with the aftermath of a tragedy. She raised her gaze to observe the twins, trying not to shift and make her uneasiness known. Ichiru sat pressed against Zero, like he was trying to meld behind his brother. A depressed-scared reaction, if his downward eyes and body language were anything to go by. Zero sat as straight and formal as Yuuki, although she bet anything it was more out of tenseness than etiquette. His eyes held a sort of breakable emptiness in them, like a cracked marble, when she accidentally met his eyes. Someone had wiped their faces clean, but missed the bloodstains in Zero’s light hair. 

“Kaien-san went out to get supplies,” Momochi said. “This is where you guys will be living from now on.”

No reaction. 

“You’ve already been introduced in the receiving room, but this is Yuuki. Think of her as like your sister from now on.”

Ichiru trembled and Zero tensed further, frown on his face. 

“Our family is dead. There’s no sister.”

Yuuki slowly turned her head up and to the side to catch Momochi’s gaze. 

_You tried, huh? You clumsy bull of a social speaker._

Kaien should have brought Fujibayashi. She said irritating things in an intentional, relaxing way. Then again, her neck and arm scars might have been considered scary. 

There was no one in the room who knew how to diffuse this sort of situation. Maybe if she had a dog, instead of a cat, Yuuki could have offered some pet therapy, ignoring the fact animals didn’t like hunters. Instead, there was nothing for her to offer besides bland, stereotypical platitudes. 

Empathy required some thought about what the boys were going through and she was _not_ going to think about family and _death_.

It took fifteen minutes of silence for Kaien to come back. 

Ignoring the fact that his announcement of ‘I’m home. Is everyone getting along well?’ was met with blank stares, Kaien instructed Yuuki to lead Ichiru and Zero to the bathrooms. He handed her two sets of soft, dark blue pajamas with the academy emblem on the right breast. It seemed the school provided both day and night clothes.

The main floor bathroom, hiding at the back of the house, was the only one in the japanese style. Its double doors revealed the initial handwashing station and two other closed entrances containing the bathtub with showers and the toilet respectively. Yuuki was… pretty sure they could operate everything they needed. Ten year olds could surely do that. She set the clothes on the counter.

“This is the first bathroom,” she said. “Do you want me to lead one of you to the second?”

Ichiru shook his head, “No.”

Yuuki thought as much. Since Zero still had his brother, she wouldn’t have to pretend to like him. It wasn’t that the feeling she had was _dis_ like, but everytime she looked at him, the world stopped being real. _You’re_ Yuuki _, you should be comforting and happy and--_

She turned to leave. 

In the upstairs bathroom mirror, starred Kurosu Yuuki. Kuran Yuuki. Imposter. Body thief. 

She released her long hair from its ponytail and leaned in, examining every pore, curve, and coloring. It _was_ her face, she had spent too long in the body to recognize it as anything else. And yet. 

The feeling was a cousin to what she experienced when she suddenly found herself five years old, except with more disillusionment than fear. What did this mean for her? Obligation to follow the original plot, what remains of it there was? Ichiru hadn’t been taken, what other events went pear-shaped?

Instead of knowing nothing, the information she had was compromised, and could possibly lead her to make unjust conclusions. Yuuki leaned back. In the end, her goal of gathering as much knowledge as she could didn’t change, it only became harder.

Walking back down to the living room displayed the curious scene of Momochi leaned back on the couch, looking lost in thought, and Kaien sitting slumped next to him, face covered by his hands. Yuuki paused at the opened door. Her _father_ wasn’t _crying_ , was he? Did he have such a close relationship with the Kiryu family?

She walked closer and patted his head, “I’m here for you.”

Kaien shifted, staring at her, no red around his eyes. Oh, maybe she misunderstood and he was just exhausted from the late hour?

“It’s hard for those guys, but it also must be hard for otou-san.”

“Thank-you, but aren’t our roles reversed here?” he said and took her hands, “Since we’re taking in Ichiru-kun and Zero-kun, I’ll need a bit of your help to make them feel at home,” Kaien tightened his grip. “However, Yuuki-chan can always come to me if she feels bad, you know?”

_But I’ve never gotten sick?_ Playing dumb would only make him sad, so Yuuki lied.

“Then I’ll be sure to rely on you.”

\---

Kaien managed to pull everyone into a stilted conversation during breakfast. 

Ichiru liked his eggs scrambled. Zero prefered apple juice over orange juice. Yuuki thought tou-san was a great cook. That great elephant in the room wasn’t discussed. It was likely whatever needed to be said, had been done before Kaien brought them to the academy. That didn’t help Yuuki with figuring out how much the massacre deviated from the plot. Ichiru looked like he would go into a flashback if she asked, Zero wasn’t an option, and Kaien was too paternal to tell her the gruesome details. He had gotten so angry when he caught her and Masao watching a horror film a couple months ago. 

Kaname might know. In the series, he was reticent and elusive. Maybe he would be when they became older. As they were now, Yuuki was knowledgeable enough to know where to push his weak spots and smart enough to detect when he would try to evade. Kaname wasn’t _putty_ , but she _could_ verbally beat him into soft clay. (Unless that had been an _act_ and he was **lying to her the entire time**.)

The question was if Yuuki wanted to even look at Kaname in the near future. Playing ‘spot the difference’ to his actual personality and his series-told personality wasn’t a game she was excited to play. So far, she had treated everyone she met as if they were real people. What if every facet of their character came from inside someone’s head? What if _she_ were created from someone’s imagination?

Yuuki didn’t have a good morning.

\---

It was Kaien who suggested she introduce Ichiru and Zero to her art supplies. 

Embarrassingly, Yuuki had been content to stay silent, doing nothing, while Kaien busied himself with paperwork and the boys hovered around her, still unsure of their welcome in the manor. It might have been a holdover from her inpermanent death, what she could do: detaching herself from the world and letting time pass until something required her attention. That was a common occurrence in the early days, when she was still processing what had happened to her. Existential stress must have brought up the old habit. 

Now wasn’t the time for idleness, though. She had children to take care of. They sat in the living room, filling in unused coloring pages on the coffee table. Yuuki was almost done with a muted sunset-colored monkey before one of them spoke up.

“Your picture is nice,” Ichiru blurted out. His face grew more and more embarrassed the longer Yuuki looked at him.

“Thank-you,” she replied five seconds too late to be natural. “Yours also looks good.”

He looked down at his drawing, a red and yellow dragon, before muttering his thanks. Zero had started on a goat, a quarter of the way blue, before losing interest. He rested his upper half on the table, looking with disinterested eyes up at Yuuki, who glanced pleadingly at him to carry on the conversation. Had she really forgotten how to talk to someone or was it because they were her own age? 

Yuuki wildly grabbed onto a topic and threw it at Ichiru, “I like your hair. It reminds me of my friend, Seiren.”

Zero interrupted his brother’s reply.

“This is boring,” he indicated to the pages and pencils strewn around. 

“What do you usually like doing for fun?”

“Spend time with family,” came the prompt answer.

She very carefully made sure not to show any reaction, “What else?”

“Play with friends.”

“...”

The afternoon was a bust as well.

\---

Kaien did the heavy work in opening up Ichiru and Zero. 

Twice a week a one-on-one session would be held in the reading room between Kaien and a twin. Trauma-focused therapy conducted by someone without a license sounded like a mistake, no matter how many child psychology books he had in his study. However, there was little option for anything else. A normal therapist didn’t know about vampires. 

Any discontentment over Kaien having never done somethinglike that with Yuuki was quickly dismissed upon further thought. After all, _Yuuki’s_ memories were suppressed. There would have been nothing for her to talk about, because nothing was wrong with her. 

A tentative pattern formed after the first week of settling in. Clothing and necessities were brought from the Kiryu household to the manor, Kaien worked from home more frequently, and there were more plates at the table. Ichiru followed people around like a permanent shadow. He mainly stuck to Zero, then Yuuki when Zero wanted to be alone, and rarely Kaien. Zero flitted from one occupation to the next, from painting to television to ineffectually coaxing Daedala into liking him. He dropped interest in studying within the day and kept up playing the out of tune piano in the library for a week. 

The library was one of the few remnants from the old headmaster, tucked underground with a half-empty wine cellar. The dust had been nearly lethal when they first opened the door. Now, the season’s incoming cold prevented long-term occupation in the small room. Without a doubt, it once belonged to a hunter or adjacent individual. On one side, medical textbooks covering blood transfusion and genetic engineering. Occult readings filled the rest of the shelves, covering the broad topics of the paranormal and mysticism. Nothing screamed ‘vampire’, the idea simply breathed down one’s neck when looking at the titles. 

If she was correct, then ‘vampirism’ would be a touchy subject for the twins, even though none of them held a tattoo on their necks. That ‘if’ was on unstable ground. Yuuki was walking blind in a changed room she half-remembered. _If_ things were remotely similar to the series, then Ichiru and Zero would _freak out_ once they saw Kuran Kaname, vampire amongst vampires. 

Within a heartbeat, Yuuki broke Kaname’s gaze, who suddenly arrived outside, and closed the curtains of the second floor recreation room window. She hopped off the couch, moving the blankets and waking a formerly sleeping Ichiru next to her. It wasn’t uncommon for him to take one or more naps during the day. Not surprising, considering Zero’s night terrors disturbed even her sleep, who had the bedroom next to the twins’ room. 

Zero looked up from where he was engaging in his newest hobby: origami. A crane and horse stood proudly at the edge of the table. Yuuki hesitated then decided to lead the boys to ask Kaien for questions so she wouldn’t have to deal with the fallout. 

“Tell Kaien-san that I’m going outside with Kaname.”

‘Kaien’ instead of ‘chichi’, because it was awkward to point out the fact she had a father to orphans who recently lost theirs. Of course, she only switched to the name when out of his hearing range. 

“Kaname?” asked Zero.

“Outside?” echoed Ichiru. 

But Yuuki was already gone. 

\---

Cool wind surged against Yuuki’s face after she opened the door, immediately hugging Kaname. A second embrace was given to Seiren, evidently he brought her along. A possible ally when interrogating Kaname or a hindrance he could hide behind. Yuuki took both vampires’ hands and tugged them away from the manor. 

“Let’s go to the gardens,” she all but ordered. That would give them privacy, especially since the new curfew prevented all students from entering the school portion during night. 

Seiren’s faint answers to Yuuki’s questions filled the air as they walked. Despite her initial apprehension, Seiren didn’t hesitate in divulging all the details of what she did during the past half year, which included a lot of training to be a proper servant and an eclectic mix of martial arts. A few names were mentioned, like Ichijo Takuma and Aido Hanabusa. They were the closest ‘friends’ Kaname had, despite his ambiguous reply when directly asked, and seemed to be on warm terms with Seiren. 

Next to the valerian resting area, she was persuaded to allow her hair to be braided by Yuuki. Lilac gray strands reached just past her shoulders and felt soft to the touch. Yuuki was intensely jealous. Her own hair and eye color was a plain dark brown with auburn undertone. 

It was as Yuuki started a half crown braid that Kaname spoke up. He had waited longer than she thought. Alone together, prolonged silence was fine. With others, he had the childish habit of not wanting to be ignored by Yuuki. 

“How have you been?”

“Chichi brought in Kiryu Ichiru and Zero,” she glanced ahead at Kaname before keeping her attention towards Seiren, who was seated between her legs.

“I heard about that. Do you get along well with them?” he said. 

“Yes. What happened to their family?”

Not a flinch. 

“I think Kurosu-san would prefer being the one to tell you.”

She smiled sardonically and said, “Because I can’t press chichi-ue for more information when he sidesteps it.”

Kaname took the safe route and didn’t reply.

“It’s okay if you don’t say. I was only wondering which level A did it.”

Seiren turned and asked Yuuki, “Aneki is saying it was a pureblood?”

“No,” cut in Kaname, voice sharp. “Why do you think that way?”

“Who else would want to or be able to wipe out a hunter family?” Yuuki said.

She continued braiding in the silence.

“Your reasoning isn’t wrong,” he said after a while. “Given the right motive, a pureblood would easily be able to.” A complicated look crossed his face. “Isn’t it frightening-- to have the sort of pow--”

Yuuki wasn’t interested in being derailed, “You’re very confident it wasn’t a pureblood. So what other possibilities are there?”

“...that sort of thing is still being investigated.”

“I don’t believe it was any sort of vampire, now that I think about it,” Seiren said. “We aren’t in a position for war.”

Narrowing her eyes, Yuuki asked, “Killing a family would escalate the situation that much?”

Ignoring the fact the vampires apparently couldn’t afford a war, the simple deaths of two hunters shouldn’t be enough for open conflict. Unless peace was already tenuous or the Kiryu were vitally important. 

“Not just one, but three? Yes.”

Yuuki slowly worked on the braid as she processed. Undoing her own simple bun, she finished up Serien’s hairstyle with the elastic band. 

“Were _three_ families massacred? On the same day?”

“It’s reported that way,” said Kaname, astute eyes observing her. “ _We_ have nothing to do with it.” 

Not only did vampires have no involvement, but Yuuki expressly wasn’t related to the matter. That was Kaname’s polite way of saying to _drop it_.

Yuuki got off her seat and faced Seiren, incidentally blocking her view of Kaname, “What do _you_ think of it?”

Seiren touched the back of her head, feeling the braid while she thought of an answer, “I don’t really care, honestly. Goshujin said ‘cause evil, an evil result’.”

‘Goshujin’ probably referred to the head of the Ichijo family, since Seiren also lived in the same house as Kaname. 

“You think hunters are evil?”

“They’re unnecessary: the council can police their own kind. That’s what goshujin says.”

“All those lessons and you can only parrot what other people said?” Kaname asked, face glaringly calm. 

The only times Yuuki had seen Kaname _appear_ angry was in a fake way, meant to be more cute than serious. Kaname’s expressions of _actual_ annoyance or jealousy revealed themselves in how he tried _so hard_ to remain apathetic to the situation. Like now: harsh words thrown from someone looking like they were watching the weather forecast. Personally, Yuuki preferred cutting insults delivered with an innocent expression. It made people doubt themselves just enough that their retort fired a second too late. 

Kaname stood up from his chair and walked to the other side of Seiren and Yuuki. Crouching down, he tilted Seiren’s face to look properly at him. She immediately lowered her eyes towards the ground. 

“If the council had their way, then what happened to you wouldn’t be seen as wrong.”

“How can it have been wrong when it gave me the opportunity to serve Kaname-sama?”

Said master’s face twisted into a new look Yuuki hadn’t seen before. One of pity, disgust, and helplessness. 

“What happened to Seiren?”

Seiren kept her head down and Kaname looked away. Alright, Yuuki just walked further into awkward territory instead of out of it. If she had said something wrong when speaking with Ichiru and Zero, she would have let the mood fester without care. The _original_ Yuuki would have lightened up the scene. 

No, she couldn’t think that way. She didn’t know what damage she would do if she went down that path. Not only was Kaien more active in her life, but Ichiru and Zero were always near. _This_ Yuuki wasn’t allowed to take days-long depression naps. Not yet. 

So she took a page out of Kaien’s playbook and gave a smile that probably just highlighted the deadness in her eyes. 

“Okay, today let’s just discuss happy things.”

Kaname looked back at her, “What do you suggest?”

“...”

Why did it feel like out of the three of them, Yuuki had the most social IQ and even she wasn’t at 100 points? The silence reigned on as each person tried to come up with a happy topic. 

“...”

“...”

“More and more birds are coming back from migration,” Seiren offered.

“Is that so?” asked Yuuki. It was true that winter was quickly turning into spring.

As it turned out, Seiren knew more than a few things about birds. The conversation turned to animals in general, to the horses in the academy, to each person’s favorite and least favorite animal. Seiren didn’t like squirrels and preferred owls. Yuuki loved cats and didn’t care for pigs. Kaname disliked horses and liked--

“Crowned cranes?” Seiren repeated, her eyes briefly flickering to Kaname’s nose before looking to the side. Small steps. “I don’t know much about them.”

“Aren’t they extinct?” asked Yuuki. The cranes used to be greatly symbolic, she remembered learning from some television program. Most of them died a very long time ago from the first onslaught of climate change. A few species had bravely survived up until a couple thousand years ago.

Shock passed through Kaname’s expression before showing sadness. “Really? I suppose that’s the case.”

Yuuki tilted her head. _Aren’t_ you _supposed to be extinct?_ The more she thought about it, the less she actually remembered about Kaname the fictional character. Sad backstory. Annoyingly mysterious. Older than he appeared even for a vampire. Incesty but not. Then he died at the end and all the fans were mad. 

Having memories of her past life to see that the world around her was fake was supposed to give her foresight and clarity. Yet, the still waters of Kaname’s thoughts were just as cloudy as before. 

He caught her gaze, “What are you thinking about?”

“I’m just wondering if you’re real.”

“We think alike a little too much,” said Kaname and reached out his hand, palm side up. “Well then, is it real?”

Yuuki took his hand. 

\---

The receiving room clock read ten minutes until eleven. 

A normal child would have had a stricter curfew. Kaien never set one for Yuuki. He either trusted Kaname to a ridiculous degree or the thought never occurred to him. It _was_ a gated academy, after all. Even the woods had a limit. Escape was futile until she grew older. 

Although she spent a few hours outside, Yuuki didn’t need to warm herself up when she entered the manor. Kaname had carried her as they walked home and the warmth of his back kept her from being too cold. The real danger was from the complete lack of outside lighting around campus. It _had_ to be intentional. Anyone without vampiric sight would need a flashlight to see and thus be easily spottable from a distance. Perfect to catch after hour rule breakers. 

The lights on in the living room didn’t surprise her. No one in the house had a proper sleep schedule. However, seeing Ichiru and Zero sleeping on opposite ends of the couch and Kaien reading on the sofa wasn’t usual. 

“I’m home,” Yuuki said at the doorway, causing Kaien to glance up from his book with a soft smile, even though he probably already heard her open the front door. 

She returned the smile out of recent habit. Ever since Ichiru and Zero came, Kaien fell back into the idea of ‘I’m going to smile even though I’m not happy in order to put the other party at ease’. Yuuki couldn’t stop him from doing it, so she joined him and tried to look happy once in a while in front of the kids.

“They wanted to welcome you home,” Kaien gestured towards the sleeping figures. “In order to see for themselves that you’re safe and sound.”

“You told them about Kaname.”

“Technically, _you_ told them about him and I just answered their questions,” there wasn’t an accusation in Kaien’s tone, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t caught on to how she shoved the responsibility onto him. 

“Were they angry?” Yuuki walked in front of Ichiru, who slept on his side, face half buried by a pillow.

“Only a little. Mainly worried about you.”

Bending down, Yuuki nudged Ichiru’s shoulder until he blinked open his eyes. “Boo.”

“Mmmh. You’re not scary.”

“Only because you’re too sleepy to see it.”

Ichiru sat up and tossed a pillow at Zero, waking him up. _Ah, sibling affection._

“...You’re back,” Zero said. 

“Yes,” replied Yuuki and turned in a circle for his inspection. “Unharmed. Unbloodied. Still living.”

Zero took her hand with a solemn gaze, “You need to be careful around vampires. Even… if they’re the kindest, most sincere and caring person you know, being a vampire will force them to do things they don’t want.”

“There are still good---” Kaien was interrupted by Yuuki. 

“I know that vampires can hurt a lot of people. That some _have_ hurt other people,” she tightened her grip. “However, ‘dangerous’ doesn’t mean ‘stay away’, just ‘be prepared’.”

“And are you prepared?” Zero asked, doubtful.

“No, but I’m trying to learn how to be.”

\---

It took three days to set up the indoor gym, filled with mirrors and mats. Another week passed until Masao was invited into the manor to see the room. Masao, who had looked at the Kiryu twins (their distinctive hair, at least) and then Kaien with wide eyes. Yuuki made a mental note to ask. 

After first meetings, there was little time wasted in getting into training. Kaien had previously tested the martial arts ability of Ichiru and Zero. They knew the basics and some specialized moves. It was clear there was the foundation of a specific style they were learning, which would now be lost. 

Yuuki speculatively eyed the staffs in Kaien’s arms. Two were a little less than two meters and the other three were more than one meter. Clearly, Kaien would allow only Masao and himself the adult-sized sticks.

“I thought you would be teaching us swordsmanship,” she said, disappointment leaking through. Kaien had demonstrated before how good he was with his side sword.

“Learning bojutsu will be just as fun.”

He ran through an introduction on the weapon, teaching them how to hold and move the staff. The next hour included paired work with rotating partners. Yuuki had to reach much higher to block Masao’s staff than she needed with Ichiru and Zero. The teenager towered over her, quickly approaching his fully-grown height. If they sparred once again, beating him wouldn’t be simple. However, Yuuki had a feeling those carefree close days were over between them. Masao was older now and probably gained friends which kept him busy, if his declining visits were any indication. 

Training ended in time for an early dinner. Kaien went out to get food from the dining hall. Most days he cooked with occasional help from one of the children. Other times they had the closest thing to ‘take-out’: fresh food prepared by the incredible chefs employed at Cross Academy. Above uniforms, buildings, and education, food was the best indicator on how good an institution really was. 

With Kaien’s ‘I’ll just be gone for a bit. Have fun! Get to know each other!’ still hanging in the air, Yuuki took Masao’s hand and tugged him upstairs.

“You haven’t seen my room, have you? Let’s go.”

The walk to their designation was longer than Yuuki would have liked. Gone were the days of the cozy groundskeeper’s house, now she lived in an unnecessarily large manor like a lord. Yuuki closed the door when they entered her bedroom. Even if the brothers they left in the living room went up to eavesdrop, each room was nearly soundproof if no one yelled. 

“Wow,” Masao said, walking around. “It’s certainly a room. With a bed. A bedroom, if you will.”

“So, the Kiryu twins.”

“You spirited me away here to ask about them? _You’re_ the one living with them.”

“I can’t ask them about the details of _that night_ and chichi won’t tell me either.”

Masao sat down on the bed and petted a sleeping Daedala, waking her up, “Don’t you think small children such as yourself shouldn’t know the details?”

Daedala bit him softly. A love bite, a warning bite. The former street cat was never very affectionate. Being constantly exposed to either hunters or vampires probably didn’t help either. 

“Ichiru and Zero know what happened.”

“Because they were the ones to have experienced it. _I_ don’t even know everything. Just gossip from aneki and some others.”

“Do you know who the three families were?” Yuuki picked up Daedala and set her on the floor, letting her hide under the bed.

Masao sighed, “The Kiryu, obviously. The Fujibayashi and the Ishikawa.”

“Fujibayashi?” she looked at him seriously, thinking of the woman who helped her and Kaien move from the groundskeeper’s house. If she were dead, wouldn’t her father be holding in a lot of pain? Kaien likely also knew the other victims. “Do you know if there were any survivors?”

“I was just told there were a few who survived. Not the names,” Masao looked at the door, “nor what happened to them after.”

“Then what _did_ you guys gossip about?”

Keiko had mostly discussed with Masao about how their family would be affected. Because there was little evidence vampires were responsible, suspicion casted itself on hunter-adjacent people and humans in the know who would benefit from the chaos. All three families, along with the Kurosu and Jinichi, traced direct roots back to the original vampire hunters. The potential permanent loss of their ancestral knowledge and DNA was a huge blow, forcing the association to rely more on orbiting groups, like the Ichinose. 

Yuuki’s solemn ‘Was your family the ones to do it?’ was met with Masao’s laughter and ‘Do you think I’d tell you if we did? No.’.

They went back to the living room, greeted by Ichiru and Zero, who immediately stopped their conversation. 

“Are you guys finished having your secret chat?” Ichiru asked, disgruntled.

“Relax,” said Masao. “We only took so long because Daedala-pi really missed me.”

Zero narrowed his eyes, “That cat hates everyone.”

“I’m super charismatic.”

“You don’t seem it.”

“Look closer.”

Yuuki stifled her laugh at Masao’s deadpan response. “Do you know what would make you really cool? If you showed us that card trick.”

“Fine. Prepare to be amazed, kiddos.”

Taking the cards from his backpack, he shuffled them and started to set five cards out.

“Oh,” Ichiru said. “We know what this is.”

“It’s sort of boring once you know it’s basic precognition,” Zero’s words caused Masao to become still.

“So gakuchou-sensei already showed you?”

Ichiru shook his head, “Some of our cousins. Can you make a card spin? _They_ were able to do it.”

“Of course it’s the Kiryu who turned such a high level skill into a party trick for children.”

“Like you were about to do-- predicting the card faces?”

Masao looked at Zero, the annoyance in his eyes clearly reading as ‘listen here, you little shit’. Before a retort could be made, the front door opened. Kaien, carrying a white box, walked into the living room and was greeted with a chorus of ‘welcome back’.

“I’m home. Are you all friends yet?” They were saved from giving an awkward answer when he spotted the coffee table. “Playing cards?”

“Sort of. Ichiru-kun was wanting to learn how to move them,” Masao not-quite-lied.

Kaien hummed and walked closer. With three steady taps on the box in his hands, the cards rose in the air. First, the four individual ones Masao layed out. Next, the ones still in the deck, floating up to separate themselves from the pack at an increasing pace. The cards circled around the four youths. Yuuki looked at their faces, spotting multiple duplicates. Masao’s deck was clearly rigged.

“Psychokinesis is less useful for hunters than remote viewing and clairvoyance. Don’t be surprised if you or others haven’t inherited the ability.” Suddenly, the cards dropped down to the wooden floor and Kaien smiled, “Now, who wants sushi?”

\---

Fresh fish. It had been a while since Yuuki last had it, when she was out with Kaien in town. Where they lived wasn’t oceanside, but close enough to see it after a couple days' travel. Seafood was still rare in the household. Nothing wrong with chopping up a chicken, however Kaien clearly had something against tentacles and scales. 

Yuuki took the last of the tuna nigiri for herself. Zero had asked if she were a vegetarian. In hindsight, her actions were too suspicious: both not eating the meat dishes Kaien made and leaving the room whenever he started to cook them. The truth was she didn’t like the sight, smell, or taste of _cooked_ meat. Yuuki wasn’t going to think about the reason why. 

“The truth is,” Kaien started, “I asked Masao-kun here to request a certain favor.”

“Whatever it is, I accept. My family told me they approved of it when I visited them during winter holidays,” said Masao, putting his chopsticks down.

Kaien frowned, “I’d still like it if I truly received your full cooperation. They already told you about my proposal?”

“Just a hint that it involved fighting vampires,” he raised an eyebrow. “Unless there’s another reason why they started training me on their anti-vampire qiang?”

The qiang was a type of spear. Was that why Masao was already so good with the bo staff? Did they have the gym lesson in order for Kaien to subtly test him on his skills?

“Ideally, you won’t ever fight a vampire,” Kaien replied. “Masao-kun, you know the intention of this school, right? To teach the children of today knowledge, understanding, and acceptance. That includes making peaceful relations with vampires.”

Masao raised an eyebrow, “You want to expose the secret to humans?”

“Not quite. I’m going to make a ‘night class’ of vampires to compliment the ‘day class’ we already have.”

“You _what_ ,” said Zero, voice flat.

“Are you saying you misheard me?” Kaien asked, looking just as serious as when he first brought the Kiryu twins into the manor.

Zero looked to the side, “Vampires are dangerous. To expose them to humans…”

“Humans and vampires won’t truly have peace between them unless they make positive interactions. A school, where prejudice is still easily breakable, is the best way to form those relationships.”

Yuuki tilted her head slightly, “Aren’t we at peace right now?”

“No,” said Masao quietly. “It’s more like a ceasefire of open conflict with superficial talk of cooperation. I know there are hunters and humans who want total domination. I’m sure some vampires think the same.”

“Which is all the more reason to not allow them into the school.”

“Zero-kun, there _are_ good vampires who are capable of controlling themselves. Trust me. I wouldn’t let in someone who might hurt my students,” Kaien said. He looked back at Masao, “I’m not blind to the possibilities. Which is why I’d like a guardian or two to watch over the contact between night class and day class.”

“So I’ll kill them if some vampire wants a human snack? Would the other night class students allow it if it came down to that?”

Kaien gave a forced chuckle, “Preferably, no one would die. You’ll just de-escalate the situation and issue punishment.”

Masao looked unconvinced, “You asked my family if I could bring their anti-vampire weapon on campus.”

“A precaution and empty threat to keep them in line.”

“Sobo says I shouldn’t carry a weapon unless I intend to carry the consequences of using it.”

“ _Technically_ ,” Ichiru cut in, “anything can be used as a weapon.”

“You try killing someone with a spoon instead of a spear, brat.”

Kaien leaned back, “Yuuki-chan at least supports me, right?”

Yuuki smiled purely out of politeness. “I sure do, tou-san.”

Laughing at the insincerity in her tone, Masao said, “It’s not completely terrible. I’ll do it. I’d like to see if it’s possible.”

“I still think there are other options besides this,” said Zero.

“I agree,” Ichiru added as he leaned on his brother. 

Kaien’s confident grin was sharp, “Good thing this isn’t a democracy.”

\---

In the late hours of the night, ‘dream’ went to the same place as ‘memory’.

Shadow figures at the edge of her vision. Rhythmic whispers like a song, like a chant. The rope prevented limb movement from the spread eagle position they were in. Fear in the form of a heavy blanket covered her. Resignation muddied thoughts of escape. She knew how this would end. Why fight? If she turned her head, she would be able to see--

Daedala’s prolonged growling dragged Yuuki fully awake. She automatically reached out to calm the cat down. Sitting up from her sideways sleeping position, she squinted at the open door. A silver-haired boy stood at the entrance. 

“Zero…-san?”

He shook his head, “Aniki had a really bad nightmare and went to talk with Kurosu-san.”

“...Okay.” Her sleep-addled mind didn’t understand why he was telling her this.

Ichiru walked towards the bed after partially closing the door, dragging along a gray blanket, “I’m still tired though, so can I sleep here?”

“You can’t sleep alone?”

Another shake of the head. 

Yuuki moved over and opened the covers. It was a large enough bed anyways. Ichiru crawled in, resting his head on a pillow. Lavender eyes remained open.

“I feel silly,” he admitted in a hushed voice, “because I know I’m too old to… But I was sleeping alone during _that night_ too.”

Placing a comforting hand on Ichiru’s head, she said, “You’re safe. Whether you’re with us or alone, you’re safe. So it doesn’t matter in the end and you can just go to sleep.”

Without further comment, Yuuki closed her own eyes. Night resumed without interruption. However, when dawn broke through her window, the streaming light revealed three small bodies on the bed. 

\---

The following day, Yuuki drew both Ichiru and Zero in the sun. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When Masao talks about 'sobo' he is referring to his own grandmother. I could have just written that in English, but I used the chichi/tou-san distinction in previous chapters, so it was a decision between consistency of family titles and using pure English. 
> 
> I haven't written a full chapter after this, so updates either might be super slow or be at the current rate of just really slow.


End file.
